


Surrender Me Your Heart

by Wanderlust3988



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh!
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Arranged Marriage, Contracts, Drama, Eventual Relationships, Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Lies, Reader-Insert, Resolved Sexual Tension, Romance, Sexual Tension, Slow Burn, Smut
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-10
Updated: 2018-10-06
Packaged: 2018-12-13 15:14:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 21
Words: 76,600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11762592
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wanderlust3988/pseuds/Wanderlust3988
Summary: You never made sense, a frustrating enigma he couldn't solve that continued to draw him in.Eventually, he found himself unable to escape, as he wondered where he had heard your name before.





	1. The Eye Of The Storm

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I realize I promised the readers of my 'If you want romance, read a book,' that this wouldn't be out till that series was over, but I'm sorry, this kept coming out while I was trying to write Chapter 36 of that and quite frankly it was distracting. I've had this in mind for a while and just needed to get it out of my system.
> 
> It will follow a similar structure, the reader has the same temperament, though the background is slightly different.
> 
> It is a slow build as far as emotions go, though the physical attraction will be almost as instantaneous as my other series.
> 
> Prepare yourself for drama. I promised fluff and smut, and I will deliver, but fair warning on the copious amounts of drama.

Taking a third part time job was not how you had envisioned spending your twenties, especially not the first summer since you had turned twenty one. Alas, sculpting your ideal life at a whim to suit your desires was simply not within your means, no, that was a privilege reserved for the rich. If you sounded bitter right now, it was because you were.

Though certainly, if it was any sort of consolation, you no longer had to tolerate your drunken tyrant of a father. With the passing of your mother two years ago, you were left unshielded against his merciless subjugation, yet for whatever delusional remnants you held of an idealistic family, and the forced affections you had expected of yourself to feel for him, you had endured him for another year and a half. Despite your best efforts to regard him in a positive light though, he had continued to be a failure to you in every way, so you had left, moving cities to escape his influence.

Unfortunately, your _tragic_ back story didn’t stand to make your current predicament any more tolerable either. Transferring universities from University of Tokyo to University of Domino in your senior year was stressful as it was, affording the living expenses and managing tuition was another beast altogether.

You had transferred this past spring, bringing with you what little money you had saved up, though affording a studio apartment in a major city in Japan, even if it was not the capitol had turned out to be a lot more expensive than you had accounted for. You had always intended to find a part time job and during the school semester, you had worked two.

Both jobs were scraping barely above minimum wage and neither very tolerable. With the completion of the first semester, the bills continued to pile up, and tuition along with your textbook fees and other supplies demanded that you take on a third.

What was worse, you weren’t even studying a field you were passionate about. You were forced into pursuing your current major by your parents and when you finally had the freedom to decide, you were already in your graduating year. Transferring credits and all the other complications and setbacks involved would have been a hassle, so you had learned to submit to your fate of walking the stage to accept a degree, and eventually a masters in international business.

There were worst fates in life, you kept reminding yourself, tying the white apron around you waist over your off the shoulder, tight-fitted black dress which grazed your mid-thigh. You closed your slightly rusting locker and took two steps before mentally cursing yourself as you remembered your note pad and pen that were still lying inside.

Your toes may have bled at the end of each night from wearing stilettos as you ran around the restaurant floor for nine hours but at least you had a third job that still preserved most of your dignity, though the same could not be said of your sanity. This, of course was still a modest statement of your situation, considering most businessmen that frequented the place treated you like an insect squashed on the underside of their shoe. This again was still preferred to being regarded a hostess and sexually harassed, both verbally and on the occasion physically.

All of this experience, and you had only been a waitress at La Lune Bleue for a week, three days if you excluded training.

“The dinner rush is starting, are you ready?” you heard the sickly sweet voice of your manager, Serenity calling your name. Not to say that you resented her, it was just that she was a degree too, well, sickeningly sweet, all the time, in a sense that her personality threatened to give you a cavity, just standing beside you. It didn’t have an off switch you were sure, not even a dial to reduce the intensity.

Of course, she was much more tolerable than the general manager who had hired you. He was a raging nutcase whenever he decided to grace the establishment with his presence, which he really ought to do more often considering his role, though given his insufferable personality; you counted your blessings that he rarely did. He had hired you solely base off your appearance, not falling short of what was expected of your textbook pervert, by descriptively describing in detail which assets besides your ‘tempting and rather stimulating’ face, he thought would be beneficial to your position. Again, he had given you the job and for that you would hold your tongue from insulting the jackass any further.

Stepping on to the floor, you saw that the place was fully packed, as expected of the place on a Saturday night.

Walking up to the booth in your section that was just seated, you smiled politely at the two gentlemen, though not really paying attention to their faces, as you handed them the menus, introducing yourself.

“You must be new,” the young man with rather unruly, raven black hair commented immediately following your introduction. “Though, I feel like I’ve seen you somewhere before.”

Understanding that they must be regulars, you initially brushed off the man’s comment as a tired and clichéd pick up line.

“I am, do you come here often?” you inquired, maintaining your cheerful demeanor, tactfully deflecting his last comment.

“Only when I’m in town, Seto doesn’t really dine out on his own,” the man who appeared to be a few years older than you continued in his bright tone of voice.

It wasn’t until you shifted your eyes over to his companion, that you realized why the name had sounded so awfully familiar. Your gaze was met with piercing cerulean ones, a stoic expression that was thoroughly unnerving and brown hair that seem to fall perfectly over his eyes.

In any other situation, you would be swooning mentally over those mesmerizing good looks, but you couldn’t get past the comprehension of who he was. The name ‘Kaiba’ aroused a sensation akin to pins and needles, sending them sweeping under your scalp, the hair on the back of your neck raising.

It wasn’t his unsociable and withdrawn disposition that was making you uncomfortable.

Realization of who the two brothers dawning on you, you could hear warning bells signalling in your mind, suddenly the significance of the earlier comment by the raven haired man you had dismissed, weighing against your mind.

While the restaurant was on the higher end, it certainly wasn’t the cut of fine dining you imagined the Kaibas to frequent. It was surprising to you to that Seto Kaiba would even have entertained the mere thought of stepping into this establishment.

Refusing to serve them would only stimulate their suspicions so you continued as if unaffected, successfully maintaining your pleasant tone of voice, which may have unwittingly adopted a slight tinge of Serenity’s unbearable pep in your concealed state of frenzy.

Taking their order after serving them their wines, you managed to swiftly gain the ire of the young CEO, when you insisted that you could accurately remember the ridiculous number of dishes the younger was ordering off the menu without noting it down. You had perfect memory; the notepad was mostly for formality’s sake.

“Write it down, there’s no way your mind has the capacity to retain all of that,” he had ordered, narrowing his eyes dangerously. You could begin to imagine what sort of effect that had on his business partner and employees, but your upbringing had conditioned you to be accustomed to such glares. Though perhaps, you should not have disagreed with the man you were trying to desperately avoid the attention of.

“I assure you, I am perfectly capable of remembering everything,” you had assured him smiling, possibly worsening his already rotten attitude.

Perhaps still you worst mistake was reciting in perfect order the twelve menu items the younger had ordered, along with the two items he had ordered back to him while maintaining a cheery countenance.

At first you couldn’t be sure if his throaty growl conveyed had displeasure or that he was at least mildly impressed. As the night progressed however, the fact that it was the former became painfully obvious.

The older Kaiba continued to be taciturn throughout you serving them, a permanent scowl etched across his stern features while the younger was much more agreeable and made small conversation with you whenever you appeared at their table.

The curiosity of if you had previously met or been acquainted was forgotten and you were grateful for it.

The service seemed to be going smoothly enough until a customer from the section over that was being escorted out after becoming a little too rowdy, pushed the waitress that had been serving him out of his way.

You had been refilling Kaiba’s glass when she had stumbled backwards, colliding into you, and forcing you into his chest.

He caught you by your wrists, holding you away from him, though only mere inches away from his body, as if you carried an incurable string of some contagious disease. His lips twisted with repulsion.

You knew you resembled a deer in headlights, eyes darting between his blue ones, while desperately attempting to conceal your erratic breathing.

His eyes always seem to have some sort of storm brewing, you observed absentmindedly.

That distracted state of mind lasted a fleeting moment, before realizing that as you fell; you had knocked over his glass of red wine over along with the entire bottle you had been holding, spilling the contents on him, effectively not only staining his dress pants and sky blue dress shirt but also thoroughly soaking him through.

He threw you backwards, away from him.

You hadn’t fathomed his scowl could possibly grow any tighter, and yet it contorted into such a severe state that you expected him to burst into flames at any moment.

He growled in exasperation as he opened his mouth to deliver certain hell before you interrupted him without even paying any mind to it.

“Oh my goodness,” you called as your senses spun into overdrive, grabbing a napkin from your apron, hands shooting out to dab at the spill. “I am so terribly sorry!”

Unconsciously your hands reached the crotch of his dress pants, which had retained most of the wine, in that the burgundy liquid was pooling in the creases of the fabric, unable to soak through any further.

In your state of severe agitation bordering on hysteria, you hadn’t realized the inappropriateness of your actions and for a few moments, the boldness of your motion even shocked Kaiba to such an extent that he was unable to react.

You continued dabbing your napkin against his trousers, turning the white cloth a burnt red as it soaked up the wine, apologizing profusely.

Eventually however, he composed himself to a degree where he was able to grip your wrist, sharply cutting of your string of apologies with his nerve chilling voice.

“What do you think you’re doing?” his glare was menacing and he stressed each of his words. This brought you back to reality. You could feel your blood flow backwards in your veins, what were you doing?

“I’m so sorry,” you began to say before he interrupted you again.

“How dare you –” It was his turn to be cut off, as the waitress who had bumped into him sprang into action, wiping down his dress shirt with a cloth, pushing you aside.

You staggered backwards a few steps in utter mortification before you spoke out of habit in observation of what she was doing.

“Akari, that’s a pinpoint oxford, dab it don’t wipe it, you’re imprinting the stain further into the weave of the fabric.”

“How do you know that?” you heard Mokuba interject from behind you, curiosity bubbling at the detail you hadn’t figured to be quite that significant.

Still overcome by your state of paralysis, you spoke again without investing much thought.

“That’s from Armani Collezioni’s core line. My older brother wears –” your eye twitched at the awareness of what you had said.

“Don’t insult me,” you suddenly heard Kaiba’s voice tearing through, a dangerous edge to his tone. “I doubt anyone in your family could possibly afford anything close to the value of this shirt.”

 _Fuck_.

You chose to stay quiet; any more words would only serve the purpose of digging yourself further into your grave. Any more careless words in the direction your previous had been going, and losing your job would be the least of your concerns.

This man possessed the ability to drastically alter the direction of the entire course of your life, you knew, and that was absolutely petrifying. He could change your life, though not in the way most would have complained about.


	2. The Plights Of An Untamed Tongue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's a gift for all you polyglot fanatics.

The words had barely left his mouth before Kaiba quite literally shoved the waitress rubbing away at his dress shirt away from him.

He pulled the napkin draped over his legs which was also partially dyed a dark burgundy, dabbing at his dress pants before discarding the cloth as he stood up. Stepping past the waitress at his feet, he towered over you.

The overly cliché phrase _‘if looks could kill,’_ distinctively surfaced in your mind. His blue eyes read murder. It occurred to you in that moment, you had possibly witnessed what it felt like to anger a god the likes of Zeus or Poseidon, and stand before him to face judgement

Deep, dark blue eyes narrowed, his lips parted and you braced yourself for the onslaught that would surely follow, but the younger Kaiba interjected.

“Please Seto, it wasn’t her fault!” he reasoned desperately.

The older, paused in thought for a moment, before directing his attention to the waitress crawling off the floor.

“Fire her,” he snarled, pointing at her. The general manager that had materialized by now and appeared as if he was about to wet himself nodded furiously.

The whole restaurant was watching.

You couldn’t begin to imagine what had convinced him to spare you, though perhaps he had a worse fate in mind for you. You visibly shuddered at the thought.

His attention returning to you, his fingers wrapped tightly around your wrist, shooting you a piercing glare before tugging you behind him as if you were a rag doll, out a side entrance.

Mokuba threw the napkin lying on his lap at the table, before scrambling to follow after you two.

The doorway led to an alley surrounded by tall brick walls.

Kaiba released you by throwing you forward, though turning around; he was standing inches away from you.

You wouldn’t shrink away despite how intimidating his glare became, in spite of the shockwaves of pure terror coursing through your veins. It was apparent that this was bemusing to him, though oddly enough, he seemed to be the slightest bit intrigued. It was important to note however, although you prided yourself in psychoanalyzing people quite well, that all these expressions were so well concealed that you questioned if you had imagined it.

Preparing yourself mentally for what would surely drown you, you just never considered that it would be the younger Kaiba that would make your head spin.

He pushed past his older brother, creating distance between you two – for which you were immensely grateful – as he asked you the last thing you expected.

“Wait! Were you ever in an orphanage by chance?” Your breath hitched in your throat at the abrupt and invasive inquiry. “About around when you were three or four years old?” he questioned, making a hand motion which conveyed the height of an average toddler. He even accurately mentioned the exact name of the orphanage.

You had been, though you couldn’t recall much memory from your time there. You couldn’t begin to guess how he had known that unfortunate detail of your past and grew apprehensive of what he intended to do with that information. Or rather, you were fearful of what Kaiba would do.

There was no sense in adding lies to the top of the very long list of offenses you were already about to be handed a one way ticket to hell by the older Kaiba, so you submitted to being honest.

“I was,” you simply replied.

“See Seto!” Mokuba exclaimed, seemingly elated, “It is her! What did I tell you, it’s not a very common name, looks the same still too!”

This apparent discovery which was still elusive to you was also apparently of no consequence to his older brother either, who remained stoic and unimpressed, though if anything, his scowl did grow deeper.

You didn’t dare asking what those words had meant, in spite of the curiosity burning a hole through your thoughts.

“I knew you looked familiar! Seto used to carry- ”

“That’s enough Mokuba,” the elder Kaiba interrupted harshly, a distinctive edge to his voice.

Your brows furrowed, unsure of which direction Mokuba’s sentence had been going in, all the while praying in the background of your mind that of all the possible punishments derived from the nine rings of hell that his older brother could subject you to, ‘you’re fired,’ would instead be the words he chose to spit at you. You would willingly lose your job if it meant escaping the nerve chilling glare that was presently being directed at you.

You wouldn’t be so lucky, though surely he wouldn’t think a designer suit was of equal value to a human life would he? Somehow, you couldn’t put it past the man.

He narrowed his blue eyes, and opened his mouth; you waited silently, boiling in anxiety as you awaited the pure venom to drip from his tongue.

 “Not only have you disrespected me thoroughly, destroyed my clothes and violated me, you have also humiliated me in the presence of hundreds of people! Do you have any idea what I’m capable of doing to you?” he bellowed, voice resounding through the night air before echoing off the damp brick walls.

The answer was yes. Yes, in fact you did know what he was capable of doing, even if not to the full extent. You’ve witnessed enough to know exactly what men of his stature possessed the power to do to people of yours, though never from where you were currently standing.

This power was likely exponentially greater given that he was the most powerful man in the country, though in that moment, it was not his influence you feared under your poised guise, no, it was the terrifying aura which he was exuding.

You feared him as a person, not as a figure. You feared the man himself rather than his capabilities, though with a man like Seto Kaiba, the line was blurred and you found yourself wondering what the difference was.

The younger Kaiba tried to come to your aid again, but he was ordered to not intervene.

“Consider this a debt,” Kaiba declared unexpectedly in a low growl as he stepped to tower over you again. “One I will collect when I see fit.”

A shiver ran through the entire length of your body.

That was definitely an infinitely worse possibility that you had not considered. The sheer unrestricted ambiguity of the situation meant you were staring off into the murky depths of a bottomless pit that could easily involve all nine rings of hell with infinite possibilities of how this man could torment you.

Words eluded you in that moment despite your mind desperate to beg the question of what his words meant exactly.

He stormed off before you could compose yourself enough to ask him, leaving you with your blood flowing backwards in your veins at those parting words.

“We’ll be seeing each other again then,” the younger Kaiba bowed to you slightly, in an unsettlingly chipper tone - which was uncomfortable given the tone of the situation - and an unreadable grin gracing his lips, following behind his brother after leaving you with a remark that left you much more perplexed than his brother’s had. “It was nice seeing an old friend again.”

_What?_

When had you been friends with that rug rat and what fourth dimension hell had you accidentally woken up in that morning?

Walking back in to the restaurant after gathering yourself, the Kaibas had long paid and left. Of course – as you were told – not before the elder had thoroughly destroyed the general manager.

The staff was astonished to see you returning in one piece.

Oddly enough, you weren’t fired as you had expected to have been and no word was ever mentioned about any form of disciplinary actions against you. What was stranger, the events of that night was never mentioned ever again following.

As the days passed by, you couldn’t help but feel that something was amiss. You wouldn’t relate the two occurrences, but your general manager seem to steer clear of you and this change was obviously reflected in the rest of the staff as well.

You simply dismissed it, but were informed later by the bartender that you were revered as the girl who faced the ‘Great Seto Kaiba,’ and lived to tell about it. You laughed quite a while at that, knowing the reality of how the events of that night had transpired, though it still didn’t quite explain the general manager’s behaviour towards you – he had no reason to not fire you.

…

A couple of weeks passed without any sign of the upsettingly handsome grim reaper coming to collect your soul, and you fooled yourself into believing that perhaps he never would, having forgotten your little debt under a pile of paperwork somewhere on his desk.

This delusion lasted until lunch service that week Wednesday.

Greeting the two gentlemen as you handed them their menus – this was starting to inspire feelings déjà vu in the back of your consciousness – you asked to have them started with their drinks.

You were merely going through the motions, before your peripherals locked on to blue ones glaring at you without reservation.

An electrifying chill swept under your skull before sweeping down each bone and nook of your spine. You imagined you closely resembled a frightened feline from a children’s cartoon; the ones with their spines arched and fur spiked.

Continuing while maintaining your composure was a cruel test of pure will power, one you knew you were progressively failing, much to Kaiba’s satisfaction. He was loving every moment of it; you could tell by the way the corners of his lips turned up ever so slightly against his the scowl that was tragically plaguing his good looks.

You were actually quite surprised that he had willingly returned to this place, given the disastrous fiasco his last visit had forced him to experience, though something told you that his younger brother might have had a hand in convincing him.

There was still a missing link in his reasoning that was troubling you.

What you were missing was the fact that this man dearly loved to torture those who crossed him, and you had found yourself deep under his skin, much further up his list of people to destroy than you would have probably liked. If even a small amount of fortune was on your side, it was that he was still unsure of exactly how he would execute his revenge, so for now, he had reserved himself to observing you closely.

Lunch progressed in a fashion that wasn’t _awful or particularly daunting,_ ignoring of course the unrelenting, soul piercing glares you received from the older Kaiba, with both the brothers working through the meal, the older on his laptop, the younger slumped over a collection of papers sprawled across the table. This being said, you reminded yourself that these exact thoughts had crossed your mind the previous time, before events promptly spiralled irreparably to the depths of hell.

Returning to the brothers with their entrees, your hopelessly long nose and incurable big mouth, though you may not have comprehended the fact immediately, claimed irreversibly, the attention of the dashing young president. Previously, you had only been subject to his ire and potential vengeance, not that his increased attention towards you would deter him from his original intentions of course.

Reading over the English reports Mokuba was slaving over; your eyes distractedly ran over the neat script, words escaping you before your mind quite comprehended.

If someone had seen you, they would have accused that you wanted to get caught. You would almost accuse yourself, if you didn’t know better.

"The word you're looking for is compliant, not complacent. Complacent means to be conceited.” You may have spared a glance at the blue eyed CEO as you spoke these words instinctively. “Employee must be compliant with Human Resources regulations," you corrected entirely in perfect English. "I don't mean to pry, but the sub-section of the labour law you've quoted is also incorrect. Subsection ten dash four only applies if whoever you're employing is a minor, and seeing as that's for diagnostics, I doubt it would be," you added out of habit before catching yourself.

Kaiba's expression read an odd mixture of displeasure and annoyance - possibly at his brother having being corrected by you or your presence in general - along with an unrestrained curiosity.

It was actually more expression than you've ever seen on the man's face.

Mokuba was first to speak.

"Woah, where did you learn to speak English like that?"

"Just here and there," you replied dismissively, questioning what was wrong with your brain.

"How well do you speak it?" Kaiba suddenly inquired, also in English.

"I'm proficient." You were fluent. You could feel your ears heating up with unease. He made a sound of acknowledgment, though he didn't seem particularly pleased or impressed; his usual scowl erasing his previous expressions.

"That's impressive, do you speak any other languages? You seem pretty familiar with labour legislation too, how?" the younger continued to inquire eagerly.

Attempting desperately to calm the erratic heartbeat you felt in your throat, you answered the question with as much scraped together grace and composure as you could muster.

"Thank you, I'm majoring in international business and minoring in human resources in university," you smiled, intentionally overlooking the first part of his question. "Sometimes force of habit gets in the way of my manners, I apologize if I was rude."

This ability of yours to manipulate your responses and in turn alter the direction of the conversation towards your advantage didn't go unnoticed by Kaiba.

"Not at all! Isn't that cool Seto?"

"Hardly," he scoffed. He so masterfully concealed his interest that it he successfully convinced you of his disinterest.

 _As expected, though I don’t ever recall requesting your opinion, asshole_. You rolled your eyes internally.

 

Serving desert, setting down the soufflé in front of Kaiba, you fell face first into his trap.

Lunch service had been especially grueling, even without the added burden of the Kaiba brothers’ presence, and your wits were not about you.

“ _What’s in this desert?_ ” he had asked, and you had responded, finding it a little curious, not only that the man had a sweet tooth, but also that he had asked such a peculiar question when the major components of the desert were plainly listed on the menu in fine print.

“ _The diners seated on the next booth over are particularly loud,”_ he abruptly declared, an undecipherable smirk tugging at the corner of his lip, “ _Can anything be done about it?”_

He was being oddly civil, though his arrogant undertone persisted. Pushing through the disconcerting feeling that you were being deceived somehow, though unable to recognize in what way, you answered.

_“I will speak to them for you, thank you for tolerating them. Is there any other way I could be of service?”_

Your response raised eyebrows, though it went unnoticed by you.

Kaiba leaned back with his arms crossed, a satisfied smirk openly stretched across his lips.

“You speak French. Perfect French. Explain yourself.”

 

 


	3. Ghosts Of Your Past

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I realize this story has significantly shorter chapters than my other fic, along with a very fast paced plot line, but do bear with me, if I didn't make all this happen now, we would never actually reach the main plot. Enjoy and as always, do let me know what you think. :)

You often found yourself wondering lately if you wore your head as a decorative ornament. If it betrayed you at times such as this, what purpose did it really serve? You couldn’t be sure when things had begun to work against your favour, though the moment this thought occurred to you, you were forced to remind yourself that things seldom worked against Seto Kaiba’s favour, if ever, and in this present moment, he was your adversary.

Apparently even lady luck worked for the rich, you thought, except this wasn’t a streak of rotten luck; the calculating bastard had ensnared you deliberately, though his exact reasoning – as always – was beyond you.

What could you possibly say to dig yourself out of this hole? You had a language fetish? You had gone to school at a private academy as a scholarship student? You were a part time European language translator?

The simple answer was you couldn’t.

“I’m an international business student Mr. Kaiba, emphasis on international. It should hardly come as a surprise to you that I double minor in foreign languages.”

He was sly, but he didn’t know whose daughter you were.

“Are you trying to impress me?” he drawled as flatly as his voice allowed him.

“Hardly,” you returned his earlier words with a polite smile. Your response was met with a snide scoff.

“Good, because otherwise you would have been disappointed to know it wouldn’t.”

You cocked an eyebrow.

“I’m ever so glad it worked out agreeably. I hope you enjoy your dessert.”

You heard him growl low in his throat in your wake.

The Kaiba brothers left shortly following that exchange. You made a point to not collect the tip the older left on the table. You may have been broke, but your pride burned deep.

You received a lecture from Serenity about that little act of defiance later – not that it did to straighten your ways, so to speak. You would do it again given the chance.

…

Thursday morning found you sitting against the window of a small café, the weather report had been a lie, as it was more often than not; the city enveloped in a thick blanket of fog instead of the bright sunshine you were promised.

Sitting across from an old friend, reminiscing old times was not how you had envisioned or even in that moment wanted to spend your morning off work. Nostalgia wasn’t bittersweet, it was just bitter. Why yearn for the bygone, you wondered.

You absentmindedly stirred your honey dew tea with your straw, cheek leaned languidly against your palm as you watched the girl with ten thousand dollars’ worth of clothing draped over her form speak.

“Oh how the mighty have fallen,” she mocked, a spirited grin playing on her face, “going to school with you, if I ever heard your name mentioned in the same sentence with Seto Kaiba’s, I would have assumed you were betrothed to him, not serving him lunch.”

“Unfortunately Yukari, not everyone can be from a family like yours. Besides, things were different back then,” you remarked blandly.

_At least, you had thought they would be._

“Of course, I’m sorry,” she quickly apologized, eyes falling over the froth of her coffee, voice reducing to a solemn tone.

Your intention hadn’t been to turn the conversation’s mood sombre.

“But please, I wouldn’t marry him if he were the last man on earth, don’t insult me,” you laughed half-heartedly, attempting to salvage the conversation from its presently ominous state.

“Oh come on now, he’s strikingly handsome and fabulously– pardon me, filthy fucking rich, what else could you possibly want from a husband.”

Of course she would say something like that.

“What is this the Victorian era? He’s a fucking douchebag. Oh pardon me, let me match you high society folk. He has the most disagreeable countenance and an unbearably mean temper. He’s unsociable and I don’t think he can smile or tell a joke to save his life,” you countered in a haughty tone. “I bet he doesn’t even dance.”

“Good thing then,” she muttered, “since you can’t do any of those things either.”

“I dance!” you declared defiantly. “Why are you here Yukari?” you growled under your breath in plain irritation, desperate to divert from the current – rather uncomfortable – topic of conversation.

“I’m having my twenty first birthday party,” she began.

“You mean you’re going to rent half of Tokyo and throw a bloody ball with every eligible bachelor in a five hundred mile radius.”

“I’m not you.”

“No you’re right, I would rent the whole damn city,” you laughed.

“Of course you would,” she rolled her eyes mockingly at the obvious bluff, “and I know you don’t like extravagant parties –”

“I hate social gatherings period,” you corrected.

“Right, well, I know you’re in a difficult position right now – but it’s only for one night, can you please come?”

“Yukari,” you sighed, almost apologetically as you met her pleading gaze. “Everyone will be there. You know that one night is all it’s going to take. I’ll never make it back here. It was hard enough leaving. Besides, I’ll stick out like a sore thumb in your _high_ society.”

“Everyone misses you,” she persisted.

“Who’s everyone?” you inquired in a cynical tone.

Those you had known in Tokyo had given a new definition to ‘out of sight, out of mind,’ refusing to even offer you a farewell for formality’s sake if nothing else, the moment they heard you would be pursuing a life – a rather different one – in Domino.

The hostility was welcome; you had always known where you stood, this particular development afforded you the faces with their masks stripped away. This had saved you the years and the complex manoeuvres you would have had to device in order to do it yourself.

You had learned early on that sincerity was hard to come by, and the less you expected it, the less you were faced with disappointment. Ulterior motives were a close childhood friend. Everyone who’s ever approached you has had them. You had suspected Yukari of such intention also, only to be pleasantly surprised when she insisted on keeping in touch after your departure.

She was a good friend, you had surmised, or the most cunning leech of them all, with her eyes defiantly set on the horizon, stubbornly insisting to herself that this phase too shall pass.

One could never be sure with people.

“You know –” she began, listing names of people who you had long forgotten to tie together with faces.

“I’m not coming,” you stated firmly. “I am very sorry, I’ll send you a gift – though I’m sure it won’t be anything that would measure up to your standards.”

“That’s not what I came all the way from Tokyo to hear,” she objected, her pitch rising as it always did when she was displeased.

You could only offer her your apology.

The two of you spent a while longer conversing about your lives; her of her lavish lifestyle, vacationing in the Bahamas and shopping in Paris and Dubai, and you of your considerably less exciting one, waiting tables and selling French pastries.  

“You know,” she added, turning around as she got up to leave, “Even if he can’t do any of those other things, I bet he’s an absolute beast where it really counts – under the sheets.”

It took you a several moments following her mischievous wink to realize who she had been referring to, or rather _what_ she had been referring to, leaving your eyes wide with disbelief, a shudder breaking through you at the thought, staring at the now vacant space which the dark haired girl with thin-rimmed spectacles had previously occupied. You heard the echo of the brass bell which hung over the door of the small café ringing in your ears in her wake.

“Dear god was that visual image disturbing,” you mumbled to yourself, colour spilling into your cheeks.

…

You would never know what country you had betrayed in a previous reincarnation to be cursed with the Kaiba brothers, particularly the older Kaiba, frequenting your restaurant as if they were regulars – they were - every weekend, which seemed to be when the younger was in town.

Seto Kaiba continued to be intolerable as he had always been, possibly growing increasingly more irritable and disagreeable; each time _he_ subjected himself to the displeasure of seeing you. You couldn’t understand what sort of revenge required such careful instrumentation. Quite frankly, while you would admit your _crime_ had been severe and quite bizarre enough in nature to inspire a certain degree of ire, you didn’t deem yourself significant enough to distract so much of the young CEO’s time and carefully curated effort. You could hardly attribute his continued visits to the ambience of the establishment or even the food, because even by your standards – or perhaps due to your standards – you deemed them both subpar, hardly spectacular enough to retain Kaiba’s attention.

“You must really hold grudges, Mr. Kaiba,” you declared boldly, though with a hint of amusement on the third consecutive weekend he had returned following the ‘French’ encounter, as you set his glass of white wine in front of him.

Mokuba’s face read unrestrained shock at your quite obviously suicidal comment. He probably believed that you had no concept of self-preservation, and if he didn’t, you were definitely beginning to believe you didn’t.

“Don’t hold your breath,” he snarled, a distinct tone of derision rolling off his tongue.

“Pardon me?”

“You wouldn’t be so lucky as to be the subject of my _personal_ ire. I hold ill will towards you, I won’t deny, but nothing about you is noteworthy enough for me to hold you with any significance, whether that be in a negative light or otherwise.”

That was a much stronger reaction than you had anticipated. It was also a higher word count than you had ever been on the receiving end of from the man. It seemed almost as if you had touched a particularly sensitive nerve he had been carefully guarding.

A simple, ‘get over yourself,’ would have sufficed had he not cared as he had so eloquently insisted.

Perplexity and vague offense at having been thus slighted reading on your face, you excused yourself as you went about serving the other patrons seated in your section.

You could also never understand why the man insisted on sitting in your section if all he held was a vague distaste for you.

 

Later in the night, you were cleaning a table a booth over from where the Kaiba’s were seated when you were motioned over by Mokuba.

“Could I get the menu back again,” he began to ask, promptly to be interrupted by his brother demanding silence.

He increased the volume of his phone with a sense of urgency, his eyes narrowing intently as he watched what appeared to be the nine o’clock news. You briefly wondered what had piqued his interest so acutely. Your curiosity lasted but a fleeting moment before the voice pouring out from his phone turned it into unreserved horror. Devastation was also very much present.

“…Kageyama Corporation has confirmed the death of Kaito and Daisuke, sons of the current chairman; president and vice-president of the company, as well as the heirs to the Aerospace Empire,” the news anchor read, “The twin brothers had been away sailing in South Africa when their boat capsized off the coast of Cape Town. After two weeks of intense search and rescue efforts falling unsuccessful, the corporation has released an official statement announcing their ultimate decision to concede the passing of the two, accepting the unfortunate incident. A statement is yet to be released regarding who would be inheriting the conglomerate empire when and if the current chairman does retire at the end of the year as planned.”

“With the health of the current chairman failing, they better find a new face or their stocks are in for a dive,” Kaiba stated blandly.

A moment passed with you staring into the blank distance your eyes had randomly assigned themselves to before your knees folded under you. Sitting on your heels where you had stood your right hand clutching the edge of the table with such force that your knuckles ran dry of blood, you couldn’t comprehend the overwhelming feeling of guilt that gripped you. Sorrow you could understand, but guilt was beyond you.

Unbeknownst to you, you felt guilt because you were feeling the wrong emotion. Social protocol dictated you feel a certain rigid formula of emotions and you were feeling sentiments well outside of those drawn parameters.

You knew what was coming.

Uncontrollable breathing ensued, chest rising and falling erratically, the influx of air this motion drew in dizzying you, your vision beginning to blur around the edges.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” the older Kaiba rudely demanded to know, ripping you from your momentary state of delirium, his tone surprisingly affording you an entrance back to reality.

It took another long moment before you could compose yourself. The application of what you were taught on how to control and conceal your sentiments required a moment to put into action in reality.

Your body for some reason had defaulted into survival mode in that moment.

Standing up, one could imagine the expressions that read on the brothers. The older of course wore his unaffected, stoic mask, while the younger was entirely baffled.

“Did you know them?” Mokuba inquired cautiously, with understandable confusion.

“I knew their younger brother in school,” you simply offered. You observed from the corner of your eye the older Kaiba’s eyes narrowing with suspicion.

“I thought Kageyama had a daughter?” Mokuba contested.

“He was fairly feminine, I wouldn’t blame you for the mix-up,” you laughed weakly, nerves still debilitated from the shockwave that had pulsed through the moment before.

“Did you date one of them?” Mokuba questioned bluntly, adamant to quench his curiosity. His brother looked as if he was debating between asking him to stop or allowing the imprudence in an attempt to appease his own desire for answers. “I mean, the reaction you just had was of someone that lost their lover, not brothers of an old acquaintance, what’s with that?”

_It certainly had been an interesting reaction._

“What? Of course not," you deflected, thoroughly flustered, "I just... suddenly felt very sympathetic for him. They were his only family,” you explained.

“And sympathy inspired a reaction that strong? His father is still very much alive  by the way,” Mokuba pointed out.

“You expect me to believe, that you went to school with one of the sons of one of Japan’s most affluent families? Possibly the most influential after the Kaibas?” the older Kaiba finally broke his silence.

“Scholarships are a wonderful thing, Mr. Kaiba.”

You would need to master the art of selling to the living dead life insurance, before you could possibly hope to have him buy what you were selling.


	4. Hide & Seek

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Excuse the fast pace, we are still no where near the plot. NO WHERE. 
> 
> Also... Unpopular Opinion: I’m not the biggest fan of Mokuba. There, I said it. Go ahead and gasp in horror.

‘ _I dare you to do that background search,_ ’ you silently challenged the look in his eye.

He merely offered a scoff in return, at least at first.

“That would require intelligence,” he simply declared a moment after, unconcealed arrogance raining down with his tone.

It took you a moment to tie this statement with your earlier words, and his conceited declaration may have offended you had you first, not known the man, and second, been in a clearer state of mind.

Neither brother pursued the conversation any further, favouring instead, at least you thought, to uncover answers by their own means as you clearly couldn’t be trusted to answer with any degree of sincerity.

‘ _What a fucking performance_ ,’ you berated yourself, internally clapping sarcastically as you left the brothers’ table.

You found yourself thoroughly disconcerted and displaced in the presence of the older Kaiba each instance you were subjected to return to the table, the look in his blue eyes eluding you. It wasn’t solely ire they carried anymore, or even disdain, and the thought   of any other sentiment being directed at you seemed like a much worse fate. You had barely grown accustomed to those aforementioned attitudes; the feeling of being an insect staining the underside of his shoe, and a part of you contemplated if there was anything worse this could escalate to.

The short answer was, you didn’t care to find out, rather, it was too overwhelming to consider.

…

Monday found you like a storm raining knives.

Reporting in for the early afternoon shift at half past one at the restaurant, you had already been disciplined that morning by the management at the department store you worked, first for failing to apprehend a shoplifting suspect, then, for doing so because apparently loss prevention was beyond your call of duty, though in reality, it was because said suspect had been some influential company director’s wife. The title of ‘suspect’ was too high an honour for her you felt considering you had caught her in the act. She was a thief; there was no way of glorifying that. The reprimanding you could have overlooked, had they not forced you to kneel before her, holding your continued employment as leverage. You’ve never been so insulted.

Seeing bloodshot eyes look back at you through the cracked and clouded mirror hanging on your locker door, you wondered if it was obvious that you had been crying. You sincerely hoped not. You had already thrown a pity party for one, and didn’t need guests.

Holding your eyes down so as to not make direct eye contact with the patrons and be on the receiving end of unnecessary and unwelcome inquiries regarding your vaguely ill seeming appearance, you refused to hold their gaze as you approached the new table.

“Do you have short term memory loss, I already know your name,” a harsh voice snapped. The scathing words causing you to momentarily forget your resolve, your eyes flicked up reflexively to appraise the source of the voice. Feeling electrified by the blue eyes staring back, a sense of mortification washed over you. Your eyes immediately fell back towards the floor, asking the heavens why the lord of hell had decided to pay a visit, all the while wishing him away. “If holding your eyes down is a form of respect, I don’t care for it,” he declared. You just knew he was smirking.

“Would you like to order drinks now Mr. Kaiba, or wait for your brother?” you inquired politely, fighting internally to maintain your professionalism in the face of his depreciative behaviour.

“He won’t be coming.”

_Then why the fuck are you here?_

“I see,” you concealed your clenched jaw behind a smile, eyes darting everywhere but at the dashing yet violence inspiringly arrogant gentlemen in front of you.

He ordered a white wine.

“What’s with you?” he questioned sharply, immediately following. You couldn’t begin to imagine what had felt displaced about you to him. You had drawn yourself two possible, very conflicting conclusions of the man’s attention towards you, first, that he didn’t pay any attention to you whatsoever and couldn’t possibly have noticed a difference – in which case, what was he referring to – or second, being as perceptive as he was, had noted down every detail of your appearance to character, and was disturbed by your current countenance.

“I don’t follow.”

“Your eyes. Your act,” he responded tersely. “Did you cry?”

You didn’t appreciate the derision the tone carried.

Clearly it had been the latter. You couldn’t be sure if it was warranted to be flattered, or if he regarded everyone he interacted with on a semi-regular basis with this much detail. He was rather eccentric; you couldn’t put it past him.

“My contacts are irritating my eyes. Though I don’t know what you mean by my behaviour.”

His blue eyes glossed over your form, calculation evident. He reserved himself to silence. It took you another moment to realize that you had been dismissed.

Walking away, you wondered if an exorcism was in order to free yourself from him.

 

 

Seto Kaiba continued to return to your restaurant frequently, and never with his brother. Whenever you were on shift, he always seemed to stalk in without fail. It was disconcerting, to say the least, even if he was a sight for sore eyes.

You couldn’t be sure if your shifts coinciding with his visits were coincidence or calculatingly planned, though considering he was always seated in your section, you would place your bets on the latter.

Conversation was scarce, the young president preferring to reserve himself to silence for the greater part of his visits, often pouring over his laptop if he was present for lunch.

You had attempted to probe why he chose to return so habitually now without his brother, especially seeing as he had made several comments over the weeks about how the food was subpar at best though hardly palatable most of the time. Each effort had been met with either a stone cold glare you were sure caused his associates to drop dead where they stood, or a dismissive comment of how it was none of your business, so by the third week, you had given up your curiosity.

This particular evening, he was again seated towards the very back of the restaurant, as he preferred, and had been thoroughly engrossed in work since the moment he had stepped foot in the establishment – so much so that he hadn’t even bothered to spare the usual derisive comment he customarily passed your way.

Refilling his glass of wine as per his request, you had turned to leave when a firm grip encircling your wrist brought you blood curdling flashbacks of the night the two of you first met.

“Read this,” he demanded, spinning you around, sliding a paper of across the table towards you without affording you any further clarity or even sparing you a glance.

Upon closer inspection, you noticed the neatly arranged script was in Korean and not Japanese.

“What led you to believe that I spoke the language, let alone read it?” you inquired in bemusement.  

“I didn’t,” he stressed his words snappishly, “though given you’re an international business student,” he stated smugly, throwing your words back at you, “it would be rather nonsensical for you to not be at least proficient in the language of our neighbouring country, without even delving into the specifics of the trade and business relationships Japan has with them.”

So his background check hadn’t gone as smoothly as he had expected, considering he still seemed doubtful of the true extent of your capabilities. You had suspected as much when he had continued to return without mention of the events of that one night, as if to do the research himself – though you were sure if was really intent on excavating the ghosts of your past, not even your precautious measures could stop him.

“Fair enough,” you conceded, eyes darting over him fleetingly, before drawing the document closer to you with your fingers, eyes flying over the lines fluently; this not unnoticed by the cerulean eyed young man before you.

You didn’t see a reason to deny his request, a certain untamed, possibly dangerous curiosity to understand the idiosyncrasies and mysterious behaviour of the irascible young man clouding your better judgement. Over the past few weeks, over the vague conversations and the perplexing interactions you’d shared, you had found yourself drawn to understand what made the young CEO tick, how the cogs and wheels in his mind spun. An unexplainable interest had bloomed, the reason eluding you, perhaps though you reasoned, he was alluring and strangely fascinating, affording a jarring contrast of brilliant sapphire blue against your mundane life which found you each day with no colour. The desire was like a moth’s to a flame you were certain.

You wouldn’t define it as attraction, merely, imprudent curiosity.

“What does it say?” he questioned, eyes narrowing.

“ _This agreement is entered pursuant to... Recipient shall be acting as…”_ you read in Korean, avoiding the names of the parties left blank in the document which was clearly a mutual non-disclosure agreement, “ _Throughout the duration of this agreement, aforementioned Disclosure Party may deem it  necessary to share of disclose certain proprietary information with the Recipient. Therefore, in consideration –”_

“That’s enough,” he interrupted you, “what is it pertaining to.”

“A mutual non-disclosure agreement,” you responded hesitantly, the inflection at the end of your sentence creating a sense of ambiguity, and leaving up to interpretation if it was a statement or a question.

“Are you unsure?”

“Not exactly.”

He released a deep hum in acknowledgement of your answer.

“Is your work experience within the confines of customer service or does it extend to administration?” he inquired unpredictably.

“Excuse me?”

“Was my question beyond your comprehension?” he snarled.

His excessive and unrestrained irritation which was clearly on a short leash tonight caught you off guard.

“No, and yes, regrettably it is,” you spoke quietly, gradually recovering from the mild shock his tone had inflicted.

“Regrettably indeed.” His voice resumed a familiar tone of derision. “How comfortable are you under pressure?”

You were deeply perturbed by how eerily closely this resembled a job interview.

“Very,” you answered out of compulsion, “I’m sorry, Mr. Kaiba, what are you hoping to accomplish through this?”

“That’s hardly any of your concern.”

“I beg to differ,” you disagreed politely, “considering I’m being subject to your inquiry of topics entirely unrelated to my service of you as your waitress.”

He didn’t however, as was expected, offer you any further clarity, snatching the document he had ordered you read from under your fingertips and slipping it into his briefcase, shortly followed by the rest of his paperwork and laptop. Within moments following that, he had settled his bill and vanished.

“I need to be exorcised,” you mumbled quietly, nodding to yourself.

…

The following night, your future began to unravel before you as your past came hunting.

Heaving a bag of garbage twice your body weight into the alleyway beside the restaurant which connected the main street with the staff parking lot and delivery docks beyond the barbed wire fences and gate, you recognized the faces of the figures roaming the parking lot, features obscured by the chain links of the tall fence and the veil of darkness, though you didn’t need to receive another glance to feel the petrification paralyzing your spine. You knew all too well.

Your fingers wrapped instinctively around the cool, steel door handle, adrenaline somehow working against you as it slowed down your reaction. Tugging at it desperately, you realized you had locked yourself out.

The dull beating of the heavy metal door against the wooden frame as you wrestled the door handle drawing their attention your way; you turned your face away as calmly as you possibly could, your limbs following with difficulty. Willing your composure to not betray you, you took quick steps forward towards the street bustling with bright lights and passing cars. With each step the initially muffled and distant conversations of the pedestrians grew louder, though it all blended into a roaring mess; this noise drowning your senses which were pulsing with pure terror, blood beating against your ears.

Turning a corner sharply around the red brick building, mere steps away from the front entrance of the restaurant, you were faced with Kaiba as he exited his limo.

You froze. You believed your emotions of dread and deep disconcertion were well concealed, though he saw right past the poorly constructed mask.

You could hear approaching footsteps in the darkness of the alley. You could feel your blood begin to flow backwards in your veins in response. Your eyes drifted past your shoulder though you wouldn’t dare turn back.

Your mind implored you to continue forward, and you very mechanically complied.

“Excuse me miss, we’d like to have a word with you,” a ragged voice speaking in a rough accent fell like sandpaper against jagged stone over your ears. “Our boss would like to have a few words with you.”

Your eyes widened as if a doe’s in headlights, chest rising and falling as your mind urged you to run, run in whatever direction – the farthest direction - your feet could carry you, and you made all the motions to.

Except you found yourself being pulled forward, something warm and rather heavy weighing against your shoulders, fingers wrapped around your hair tie; your hair cascading past your back undone. You comprehended distantly that your conscious mind was registering all these events seconds late.

They had found you so easily.

You found yourself confined in a dark, closed space, the cold air prickling your skin under the draped trench. Your mind registered the closing of a car door to your right somewhere.

“Drive,” a cold voice demanded.

Was this a better alternative; you wondered.  


	5. Unexpected Proposals

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Excuse the short chapter, for any of you still reading this fic, I am back from hiatus. Forgot this fic existed for a hot minute, but I am hoping to update this more frequently going forward! Enjoy :)

Soft, muffled sniffling punctuated the distant crackle of gravel under tires rolling over smooth asphalt. Your attempts at concealing your whimpering were failing you miserably, sound escaping beyond the hand clasped over your mouth, but at least you weren’t sobbing. No, you wouldn’t want him to see that, though certainly, even your current display you considered pathetic. It’s not as if the eventual appearance of those goons were entirely unexpected. You had merely been counting the days until they traced you like blood hounds on a hunt, so then why were you so aggravatingly unprepared? What would have been your plan if a certain CEO had not appeared at that exact moment and whisked you away?

Where _was_ he taking you away to, and why?

Held captive by your own disarrayed thoughts, you had not heard the car roll to a halt, only escaping your trance when a firm hand wrapped around your wrist, drawing you roughly out of the limousine’s backseat.

He threw open the passenger door open of a dark car of which you couldn’t tell the make under the cover of night, before forcing you in. He swung around the front, stepping into the driver’s seat, tearing away from the sidewalk.

You didn’t recognize the streets passing you, the neighbourhood growing discernibly more affluent; posh mansions, inspired by Victorian England and nineteenth century France lining the tree fringed road.

“Where are you taking me?” you questioned, tugging the trench coat closer to you.

This query earned the ire filled attention of a pair of dark cerulean eyes. “I don’t think I’m the one who owes you an explanation,” he growled, effectively quietening any further inquiries you may have had for him.

The car paused briefly before a grand, wrought iron gate guarding an English mansion much more magnificent than the ones you had passed, waiting for the gargantuan structures of metal to grant entrance.

 

Driving past the evergreen lined path, he parked before a series of steps leading up to a pair of grand mahogany doors. Throwing the keys at the awaiting butler as he left the car, he once again pulled you by the wrist, this time navigating through a labyrinth of Prussian blue carpeted hallways.

Practically shoving you into what appeared to be a palatial drawing room prepared to receive guests, decorated again with shades of cobalt and Prussian blue against brilliant white, and adorned with hand painted Ming vases and awe-inspiring paintings, he sat across from you on a royal blue tufted settee, another breaking your fall.

“Mr. Kaiba, what the hell are you doing?” you demanded, finally having found your voice.

“That’s hardly a way to thank your saviour, now is it?” his lips crooked into a smirk, crossing one leg over the other smugly. “I don’t know why you have loan sharks chasing after you,” he spoke, his irritation setting over his features previously displaying amusement, “and quite frankly I don’t care.”

Your eyebrow hitched in response. _Loan sharks?_ Is that what Kaiba had made of your pursuers? Had the old man hidden the trail back to him so immaculately or was the older Kaiba already growing senile at the age of twenty seven?

“Alright,” you stammered, “tha– thank you, for getting me out of there. Why have you brought me here?”

Was he finally ready to exact his revenge for his spoiled suit, or did he have something more sinister in mind?

“I didn’t realize I frightened you this much,” he smirked again, smug all over as he observed your poorly concealed trembling, though in your defense that was primarily a result of the adrenaline still coursing through your veins.

“I don’t know what would have given you that impression,” you challenged foolishly. Your words drew him from his seat, your eyes following with certain terror.

He strode over, around the glass coffee table. Your heart began to palpitate, reading the dark glimmer in his eye. Towering over you, his lips sharpened into a dangerous smirk before leaning over, one arm anchoring against the backrest, past your shoulder.

You could feel his hot breath kissing your skin, his face a hair’s breadth from yours; his cascading fringe grazing your forehead.

“It’s understandable,” he husked, “We are alone after all.”

Was that a threat?

A chill swept under your skin and you swallowed. Regardless of what his intentions had been, it succeeded in instilling fear in you.

Continuing to mock you with his up curled lip, he pulled away, before seating himself beside you, arms crossed. He was playing with you, that much was obvious, like a cat with an incapacitated mouse, and procuring great pleasure from the act.

You wouldn’t look at him directly, eyes only managing to flicker in his general direction.

“Before I tell you why I brought you here,” he spoke hoarsely, “there’re a few things I need to know.”

“What?” you whispered, shrinking into yourself at the close proximity.

“The orphanage,” he began, tone growing somber and a chill burned down your spine, “there are no records of you ever having been there. What happened?”

“I don’t remember.”

“Is there anything you remember?” he demanded, patience thinning. You shook your head, desperate to know what he was after. “Do you remember me?” he spoke in a rasp. It was the first tinge of desperation and vulnerability you had sensed in him.

“I’m sorry,” you whimpered, and just as soon as you had heard his tone thaw, it had frozen again, features hardening into a scowl.

“I see.”

He stood up abruptly, turning away from you.

“If that’s all Mr. Kaiba,” you managed, before he sharply interjected, spinning around to face you again.

“It is not.”

“If this is about your suit, I really am sorry, I didn’t mean to – it was an accident.” You had contemplated deeply on whether it was wise to evoke memories from that night and yet in a desperate bid to fill the silence and unbearable suspense, your tongue had slipped. “As you well know,” you added, compelled to continue speaking in spite of yourself, “I’m not in a position financially to compensate you for the suit –”

“I don’t want your money,” he scorned.

“I will do my best having it dry cleaned then,” you offered, debating whether dry cleaning a twenty-thousand dollar suit would do it more harm than good.

He sneered, “That suit’s already in the garbage. This isn’t about some damn suit.” He appeared as if he was about to speak again, before the appearance of a maid at the door drew his attention. “What?” he snarled, his voice quite literally reverberating against the walls, evidently shaking the young woman at the entrance.

“Master Kaiba,” she stuttered, “The mistress would like to know if your guest would like refreshments.”

“We’re fine,” he barked, ordering her out, turning to you.

“You’re married?” you found yourself questioning before you had quite processed the thought, inexplicably disappointed to some extent.

“What?” he husked perplexed. “No.” His response led you to deduce that the maid had been referring to the head maid of the household. His lips settled into a conceited smirk after a moment of thought, “Would it bother you if I was?”

“Your personal affairs are hardly of any consequence to me, Mr. Kaiba,” you quietly disputed, beginning to wonder how you had found yourself in this conversation.

“So you say.”

“Pardon me?”

“I have a proposition for you,” he suddenly offered, towering before you with a cross countenance. With your silence you prompted him to speak, unsure of how to respond. “The position will require you to be willing to spend the majority of your future in close proximity of me.”

“I’m afraid I don’t follow.”

“In return I will settle whatever debts you have procured.”

“You mean my student loans?” you spoke without considering his words.

“Those too.”

Had he finally gone mad? What could possibly have prompted him to make such a ludicrous offer, especially without knowing the extent of your hypothetical debt? Assuming that he was referring to the supposed debt you had borrowed from the ‘loan sharks’ pursuing you,  he couldn’t possibly have an estimate for how much you owed; though not that it mattered, the man could easily pay the accumulated national debt of the United States, Japan and Italy combined without the expense putting a dent in his finances. What exactly was this position that he was proposing you sign up for, and what drastic obligations did it expect you to fulfill?

He produced his phone from the breast pocket of his navy suit jacket. Exchanging a few words with who you assumed to be his assistant, he marched out of the room.

Returning almost as quickly as he had left, he laid a silver briefcase over the coffee table. From within the confines of the imposing case, he retrieved a thick stack of papers, appearing to be a contract.

“I advise you decide carefully,” his voice was coarse against your ear, “it’s a position which _will_ require you to represent the Kaiba name with distinction, though I hardly think you’re in a position to refuse my proposal.”

Your eyes drifted from his unsettling smile – if one could call it that – to the fine font stretching across the many lines of the document, brows knitting together.

Now, you were convinced he was mad.

It was only a question of which man you could endure to have in your life, though the thing about men, was that they were all flames, and ultimately, you reminded yourself, they all set moths ablaze.


	6. Pick Your Poison

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’ve been a little busy with the other story but hi everyone! The story takes a complete left turn in the chapter. Do let me know what you think :) Fair warning, this isn’t as clean as the other one, though admittedly, that’s oretty dark right now too.

For many number of reasons - none you were willing to disclose to him to make your case - you were well versed in the nature of, including its privileges and restrictions, an employment contract for an executive assistant serving a chief executive officer. What you were being presented, was not it.

“I understand you’re looking to employ me as your executive assistant.”

“So you’re literate,” he sneered, “that’s certainly a relief.”

“No, I just meant, does Kaiba Corp. provide all its employees with a accommodations in the most opulent part of town along with their own personal vehicle?”

“You live in a dump and if I waited for you to take public transportation every morning, nothing would get done. I don’t have that kind of time to waste away.”

Then why insist on hiring me, you challenged in thought.

The background check wasn’t unexpected, at least not more unexpected than the first, nor did it feel particularly violating, though you were curious to know what results this investigation had yielded. If it had turned over anything of worth, you inferred this would be an entirely different conversation, or perhaps your red herrings were recognized, and what he was affording you was the illusion of the upper hand. Perhaps this wasn’t even your game, or perhaps, and this was the most unfavourable, it was your court, and he was attempting to tie marionette strings on your limbs.

“So...no, your answer is no.”

“I hardly see how that’s relevant for you to know.”

“Are you looking for an executive assistant Mr. Kaiba or a life companion?” you inquired.

“What?”

“Well, it’s just that...select your wardrobe, accompany you to breakfast every morning by six a.m. sharp - at the latest - to brief you on your day’s schedule, expect to work late nights, when not in your office in your study here,” you briefly cited the clauses, “be available on weekends for business trips, meetings and excursions, accompany you to events as your date, pay attention to your mental well-being by which I assume your stress...

“Mr. Kaiba, these requirements strongly border on the duties of a wife. How does this defer from a slave contact?”

Of the clauses which constituted the contract, the majority were crafted with the singular intention of shifting the power dynamic exclusively in his favour. It was a predictable move given the man, but the theory of the marionette re-surfaced in your memory.

“It doesn’t, though it’s not as if you aren’t being compensated handsomely for it,” he quipped.

Yes, you had noticed, the sum exceeded, to a concerning degree, the earnings of a favoured escort. It was a convenient point of comparison to have at your disposal, though how you had come to be in possession of that information was not what one may expect.

“Whether you choose to sign it or not,” he drawled, offering you a fountain pen from his breast pocket, “is entirely at your discretion. Though given your current predicament, could you afford to refuse?”

It was more a question of what you could afford to sacrifice.Your eyes darkened in contemplation as your brows drew together like stormy clouds. Would this grant you diplomatic immunity, or did blood burn deeper than ink?

“I’m a busy man,” he reminded in a growl, “I expect a decision within five seconds.” He would allow you no time to comprehend those words as he began to countdown.

“That’s unreasonable,” you objected, “I haven’t read past the first page of the contract.”

“Do you not trust me?” Was that a joke? Laughing maniacally, he advised, “Learn to take a calculated risk. I need a woman who can think on her feet...three...two...”

It couldn’t be a calculated risk, you wanted to remark, if you had no concept of the proposition, but he already knew that. As his tongue clicked the bottom of his palate at the count of one, you snatched the pen from his slender fingers in mad desperation to escape the hunt Kaiba had so graciously afforded you sanctuary from. Sifting through the papers, you sought the last page, signing your name on the dotted line.

A unsettling smirk crooked his lips, gloating of his victory.

“Executive assistant or wife,” he spoke in a low husk, countersigning the document, “they’re both people I didn’t have in my employ.”

“You can’t employ a wife,” you pointed out and his smirk grew.

“With this signature, it’s the same difference,” he dictated

You were left nonplussed.

From the pocket of his slacks, he produced a set of car keys. He tossed them over your lap.

“I don’t drive.”

“I realize that,” he grit his teeth. “It’s a spare set. I’ve assigned you a driver and guard to chauffeur you.”

It would be fruitless to question his intentions, much less challenge them.

“Quit your daydreaming and get up, we’re leaving,” he ordered.

“We?”

“That’s what’s concerning you from my sentence? You don’t care for the destination?”

“I assumed I was being sent home.”

“Try again.”

...

You found yourself thrown into the passenger seat of a red Maserati. Your knowledge on the subject of cars were dismal, but this particular one you recognized.

He refused to indulge you with clarity on your destination, though not for your lack of trying.

“I didn’t know you could drive,” you remarked, glancing over at the death grip he held over the wheel.

“That’s an idiotic thing not to realize.”

You elected to remain silent for the remainder of drive following this quip; your aversion spurring more from intimidation to his prickly hostility rather than a sudden disinterest in comprehending in deeper clarity the role you had so eagerly accepted. He was not a conversationalist, you had known.

Still, being in such close proximity, in such a confined space, in spite of your inhibitions of him, it was difficult to curb the attraction which burgeoned. His scent lingered around the space; notes of fresh chypre and warm, understated cologne. For weeks you had dismissed it as reckless curiosity budding from a place boredom, too barren a daily life to otherwise employ your thoughts and a worrisome lack of hobbies - or rather the necessary funds to execute a hobby. You needed to convinced yourself you were hallucinating on the scent of his cologne.

Your eyes glanced back to his long fingers curved against the steering wheel, one hand fallen to his side, and your imagination sparked images of them slithering over your bare skin. You shuddered.

“Are you cold?”

“No.”

...

He was cautious as he led you through the underground parkade into the lobby of a building. It appeared to be a luxurious apartment complex situated in one of the most affluent areas of the city.

The rose gold rippled, white marble floors of the lobby gave rise to black marble walls. From the window frames to the glass doorways and mirrored elevators, every frame and structure was gilded.

With a palm over your lower back he guided you, his eye never straying from their thousand yard glare.

On the twenty-first floor you disembarked from the elevator, to a garnet hue carpeted corridor; the broad passage boasting immaculate ivory walls.

Marching to the furthest mahogany door, embellished with the numerals ‘2101,’ in a stylish gold, he slid the cover on the lock, punching in a series of digits. You appeared to share the floor with two other suites.

“The password,” he advised, passing a folded slip of paper to you, as he clapped on the lights.

The glaring glow of the lights illuminated a colossal suite with ceilings sitting at least twenty feet high.

Reaching over your head he dimmed the intensity of the chandelier with a turn of a dial.

The apartment was decorated in monotonous hues of steel, slate and onyx.

“Ogle in awe in your own time,” he jeered, “I don’t have a time for a house tour. There’s something I need to show you.”

You were adamant that you had not been staring, much less ogling. The suite was extravagant you would admit, and decorated without sparing any expense, to its credit, though that hardly fazed you. What was disconcerting to you as you considered was what steep price accompanied such a lavish generosity. Kaiba was nothing if not a man who believed in even exchange or worse, transactions where the conditions were manipulated to his favour. Your services to him as an ordinary - if the terms you had agreed to could still be considered such - executive assistant could hardly be justified as even exchange. Which part of your soul was he planning to harvest?

He pulled you by the wrist to a bedroom; black panelled glass wrapping around the far curve of the room, affording you a mesmerizing view of the glittering city. Silver, chiffon curtains cascaded from the ceiling at least thirty feet high to dust the dark wooded floors; the theme of matte steels continuing into the room. To your immediate right was a large bed, its sheets a luxe black. The lamp shade on the nightstand was interesting; resembling a wrapped piece of parchment enclasping the air. On the navy accent wall above hung a canvas, an abstract rendition of smoke and gold dust. By its foot, a Sacramento green ottoman, standing on silver legs low off the ground. Against the glass, the far corner of the room housed a short end table housing decorative books and a plush chair accented with a silver pillow. Over it poured a floor lamp; a thin, steel bluebell.

Striding impatiently around the bed, his footsteps dulling as it traversed over matted carpet, he stood by a narrow door where the glass wall curved to meet the wall.

“Are you coming?”

Scrambling to follow, you took hasty steps to meet him. He twisted the lock carelessly to reveal a walk-in closet as the door swung open; dark navy walls showered in gold light displaying rows upon rows of designer dresses, heels, coats and cashmere shirts, among other regalia.

Your lips parting to a gasp, you were transfixed.

“I couldn’t,” you refused, shaking your head.

“Nonsense,” he chided, drawing you forward by your wrist.

Ripping a smooth-wooded hanger off a high rack, he held out a wide-strapped, herringbone print dress with a sparse, maroon check overlay. It was short, it’s neckline carved deep, with underwire defining the chest.

“Try it on,” he demanded, holding it against your figure.

“Right now?”

“I need to know all of this fits, I had one of my secretaries shop based on estimation. This would all be a humongous waste if it was purchased in the wrong size.”

Swallowing thickly you accepted, fingers gingerly wrapping around the arched wood. Your fingers brushed on accident as your exchanged the dress, and against your volition, your heart stuttered. The dress was in your hands, but your gaze he still held, forbidding movement.

He raised an eyebrow, a smug smirk curling his lip. “Well?”

Gasping, you spent your strength uselessly in summoning your composure; it proved impossible. You were comfortable under the scrutiny of powerful men, you would never falter. It seemed you had found, perhaps developed, an exception. He was always the exception.

Sparing only another moment, he brushed past your shoulder into the bedroom, leaving you to change.

Slipping into your underwear, you stepped into the dress. Sliding the second strap past your shoulder, you sensed his presence loom behind you. Warm fingertips pressed against your back as his index finger hooked into the circular sliders of the decorative zipper, drawing it up the fine teeth. Your heart palpitated with erratic convulsions. You bit down on your inner cheek to contain the shudder which threatened to break.

Turning you to face him, your head fell to cower from his stormy gaze. It was then you observed the bridge of your black lace bra peeking out from between the deep neckline. It was obvious now that the dress was intended to be worn as a pinafore.

That shudder finally escaped, satisfying the young CEO.

With creased brows, he brushed the back of his fingers against your protruding collarbone, all of his attention invested in the gesture, starting at the valley between your clavicles, and swiping them through to lightly shift a strap to the edge of your shoulder. Another shudder.

  
The ambience was rapidly shifting to insinuate other things; you were all of a sudden the kept woman.

His large hands dove for your waist, lifting your small form against his. Crushing his lips into yours, he slammed your back against the narrow strip of wall punctuating two carved display cases. Past his ear, and through the haze of blood pounding behind yours, your enlarged eyes observed the opposite wall of the closet, lined neatly with crisp, white, men’s collared shirts and an assortment of suits.

Your arms circling his neck for support, his lips strayed over your sharp jaw to tease the pulse under your neck’s soft skin.

You suddenly understood the principles of this exchange.

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know your thoughts :)


	7. Principles of Exchange

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I shall say nothing here and let you all speak.

“This wasn’t part of the contract,” you gasped, nails digging into his neck.

His lips briefly paused their assault on your bruising neck. “How would you know?” he challenged between ragged breaths. “You didn’t read it.”

“Because that would be prostitution, and therefore illegal.”

“Call it payback for my suit,” he smirked darkly, meeting your gaze.

“You want my body in exchange for a suit?” you wheezed, incredulous.

He hovered his lips by your ear, hot breath pouring in waves over your skin. “Is there a problem?”

You were paralyzed, a cold sweat breaking over your skin. Your silence was his answer.

Why were you not averse to it? Should you have resisted on the account of your pride?

He smelled incredible.

His lips returned to yours, sucking on your lower lip, his fingers hitched up your skirt. His lips devoured yours with an insatiable fervour, darkening them with his saliva. Stripping the zipper he had just done up, he pulled the dress to fold over around your waist. His palms were cupping your ass.

“I’m not on birth control,” you gasped, breaking away. Hell, you had never kissed a boy, much less been with a man.

“I’ll take responsibility if something happens,” he husked, without stopping to consider, tearing you away from the wall and carrying you to the bed.

Had the sharp edges of your convictions on men already grown so dull, subdued by a few moments of his company, that you were willing to allow him to deflower you with blind compulsion?

The satin sheets broke your fall. He shed his suit jacket on floor, his tie undone and tossed soon after. He un-did the first couple of shirt buttons constricting him before he clambered over you as if a predator mounting its prey. Your gaze resembled perfectly a doe in headlights, and fittingly, his, the eyes of a panther.

You wondered if it was of any consequence whether he knew that it was your first time. Considering the man in question however, you resolved that such sentimentality would only inspire derision and contempt.

He lifted the dress past your ankles, before splaying them on either side of him once again, kneeling between your legs. Laying over you, his breath breaking against the crook of your shoulder as his lips attacked your neck, he slipped his arms under you, fumbling for the clasp of your bra. Once his fingers found it, he expertly unclasped it, separating the garment from muggy skin.

Exposed under him, reflex animated your arms to fold over your naked breasts. Having anticipated this, you found his arms pinning your wrists into the sheets, a wild smirk sharpening his lip as his eyes poured over you, committing to memory the contours of your bare form. It was unbearably violating, and in that vulnerability you discovered disconcerting arousal. Your full breasts rose and fell on your arched back with each breath, willing for him to ravage you.

“You were much more submissive than I expected you to be,” he purred, knotting your breath. “I like that in a woman.”

Yours was a whimper in response, “What?”

“I expected you to be much smaller under there,” he remarked, though more to himself, his fingers kneading your breasts. A blush flooded your face, dying your skin a deep rouge.

You lifted your liberated arm up to the buttons of his shirt.

“Eager, are we?” he chuckled, releasing your other wrist. “You’re not what I expected you to be.” You only heard his words through pulsing blood coursing behind your ears, threatening to give way to blank noise.

As you lifted both arms to undo his shirt buttons, he leaned over you, folding your arms between your two bodies, while his massaged your breasts. His lips claimed yours wet with his saliva and his hips were rutting against the junction of your thighs; his aroused bulge prominent through his dress pants.

Your fingers splaying over the back of his neck, you pushed them to thread his hair, silk knotting in your fingers and pulling him closer.

Nimble fingers tangled against the black lace of your panties, almost as if in response, ripping the scanty piece of fabric, your skin burning where the lace had grazed as it left you. A groan muffled against his lips as you writhe in pain, his hips pinning you down.

This wasn’t how you had envisioned your first time, there was no romance, no candles or dismembered rose petals sprinkled over sheets; you couldn’t even be certain of his intentions towards you. Still, you wanted him. For weeks you had fantasized him doing unspeakable things to you, deep beyond the realm of morality, in denial and depravity, you had imagined the rough touch of his fingers, the break of his hot breath, secretly, when your conscience slept. It was always there; the contours of his face, lingering before your eyes like an afterimage; the mirage of his presence beside you in bed. You could deny it, and perhaps all it was, was an unoccupied mind desperate to employ its imagination and passion into some receptacle, perhaps all you were, was confused and misguided, but you craved him and for that infatuation to be reciprocated, was maddening. It had always been subdued, and now it was called to consciousness.

Lifting away, his arms anchored into the sheets, he appraised your from after he had stripped you entirely bare. He seemed satisfied, though a vague smirk was your only indication through an impassive mask.

He allowed you to unfasten the remaining buttons of his dress shirt. It fell open, affording to you a partial view of his lean chest and chiseled abs.

One hand under you, he settled on his side beside you. He captured your eyes with bottomless, blue storms, his fingers ghosting over your protruding ribs, past your stomach, to tease into quivering lips. Your whole body twitched as his finger brushed your nub, before hooking shallowly into your trembling sex. Your back arched and your walls contracted all around him at the previously unfelt sensation, a strangled mewl escaping your throat. He smirked, but he would say nothing. Drawing the two fingers out, he traced his way up to your erect clit, circling his fore and middle fingers in vibrating motions.

With eyes darkened by lust he plastered his lips over yours once again, his left arm folding up from under you to play with your nipple; roughly tugging and pinching the elongating bud. His fingers pleasuring your nub never ceasing. Releasing a contended moan, you allowed your eyes to fall shut, your head weighing back against his arm.

“I never took you for a whore,” he chortled in your ear, removing his lips for a fleeting moment.

“Please,” you whined. Your fingers closed around his shoulder. “I’m not a...not a whore.”

“Why?” he rasped, continuing to pleasure the mouth of your arousal. “Do you not like being called a whore?”

“I -”

“Your body tells me otherwise,” he chuckled, fingers soaking into your wetness. “Your body tells me you liked being called a whore...my whore. Tell me you don’t like it.” He was challenging you, he was challenging you because he knew.

“I like it,” you heard yourself whimper, gasping as he injected his fingers deeper. You must have gone mad.

“Then act like one,” he snarled, furiously driving his fingers in an out of your pulsating core. Your heart palpitated, a reedy scream ripping out of you as you arched into him. Your fingers grasped at his hair, pleading nonsense. “I should have done this to you a long time ago,” he laughed, “you look good like this.” He abruptly stopped, bringing his wet fingers to his lips, sucking at your juices while watching you with carnal eyes. “That’s enough foreplay.”

Unbuckling his belt he unclasped his pants, discarding it over the edge of the bed. It disappeared, you couldn’t fathom anything existing beyond the realm of the bed. From his briefs he produced his throbbing manhood; thick and veiny. Your breath stolen from your lungs at the sight you lay under him, paralyzed. His length was impressive, certainly, intimidating and greater than you could have imagined, though more concerning to you was his girth. It would be impossible for you to accommodate.

Your palms anchored against his pecs.

“What is it?” he inquired in annoyance, one palm stroking his length.

“It’s my first time,” you blurted.

A smug smirk gave way to a cocky laugh. “I figured,” he rasped. He allowed a thoughtful pause. “It’s going to be uncomfortable,” he advised sincerely, “you need to relax.”

Swallowing hard, you nodded, your flushed skin writhing with electric current at the mounting anticipation.

Positioning his tip against your inner lips, he gouged your sex, ramming into you. You drew in a sharp breath, a shrill scream straining in your throat as you curved up to him. He exhaled in response, brows drawing together. He had intended to fill all of you, but you had clenched, tensing at the tearing sensation; the friction his thickness caused unbearable. Even if you hadn’t, it would have yielded the same result.

“How are you so fucking tight?” Kaiba cursed. He had undone virgins before. The tightness of your walls only stood to tempt his further, the young chairman maddened by the intense sensation. This was enough to convince him that he needed to have you every night.

He entered you again slowly, though with a rougher thrust, forcing your walls to part and accommodate him.

Tears beading at the corners of your eyes spilled and wet your temples, gathering in your hair and chilling your burning ears.

“It hurts so much,” you wheezed, nails piercing his back.

He hissed, and you expected him to speak, instead he lowered himself on to you, binding your arms against your side with his arms snaked under your back. He wouldn’t offer any words of comfort as he began to thump your throbbing sex. He followed a rhythm; his hips crushing into you, forcing his erection to contract your walls, filling you, then grinding against you in a circular motion.

Pleasure and pain twisted in you lower abdomen as he hammered you repeatedly with his erection, and you pressed your face against his clammy neck, tasting the salt on your palate.

He grunted obscenities in your ear, swearing about your tightness against your breathless whimpers.

He prompted you to wrap your legs around his waist, advising in a corse growl that it would ease the pain. It did, while also allowing him deeper penetration.

A strained moan rewarded him. “Mr. Kaiba,” you managed to gasp; your lips the only part of you unbound by his form and allowed to move.

“Fuck,” he swore, beating into you.

“Mr. Kaiba,” you repeated in plea, the words begging to release you so you could brace yourself against his thrusts which unravelled your core never quite producing themselves.

“When I’m with you this way,” he groaned, “call me Seto.”

Seto, you repeated in your hazy mind, it didn’t agree somehow. It was too personal; too intimate. Yes, too intimate to call the man currently ruining you in the best possible way.

“I can’t.”

“Why the hell not?”

“It’s too...” The words wouldn’t manifest, your impassioned mind scorching all sensible thought, and sense in general. He was fulfilling some animalistic desire of you hadn’t fathomed existed, and it was seizing all thought.

“You feel amazing,” you moaned in a maddened fit.

It was mortifying though it seemed to amuse him, eliciting a guttural chuckle.

Leaving you entirely for a brief moment, drawing a querulous growl from you, conveying your discontent, he forced you on your front. His hand slithered between you and the sheets, cupping your breast with his palm. His other hand, having prepared his cock against the entrance of your arousal, hooked into your mouth.

“Suck on it like a good little slut,” he taunted darkly in your ear, plunging his sex into you from behind. You obeyed.

His lean yet heavy form weighed against you, pressing you into the sheets, and with each thrust, his fingers gagged you with their length.

He ground against your walls and against one particular spot, your vision blanked; phosphenes blossoming on nothingness.

You chocked on his fingers, your heady moans strangled against them.

“You like that?” His fingers left your mouth to pull at your hair. “Do you?” he roared louder against your ear.

“I - I do,” you surrendered. “Please, right there, again.”

Pressing a rough kiss against the curve of your ear, he fucked you harder against that same spot, over and over, until you could see nothing in front of you. You moaned shamelessly, begging him for more. Your cries were a fine tuned instrument to his ears.

“Seto!” you relented at long last, as an uncoiling sensation fizzle against your lower abdomen, stimulating every nerve. Your walls grasped at his cock, tightening around him.

“Come for me,” he ordered, “now.”

Something splintered. Those words were enough to undo you entirely, and you screamed his name again, feeling lightness encompass your whole form, drowning you in utter ecstasy. You distantly registered him curving over your form, forcing you into the sheets. The motion stabilized your convulsions as you came all over him. “Isn’t this what you’ve been begging me for?” He yanked your head up by your hair. “Isn’t it?”

You nodded, or you believed you did, as he pressed your face back into the sheets, continuing to fuck you. His arms dove under your back, rendering you motionless. He maintained his violent pace for what felt like forever. You had forgotten how to form a thought, much less how to keep time.

You could hear him grit his teeth against your ear, his jaw clench as his head fell to the crook of your shoulder. His pace collapsing, he swore your name for the first time, unable to restrain the pleasure overwhelming him.

You felt his cock throb inside you, then again.

You wanted to tell him, not inside of you, but his weight was crushing you into the sheets; forming words were impossible. Even the thought you had formed with much difficulty. You were much too spent to resist him.

You hoped he would pull out; he was a calculating man, and carelessly impregnating his executive assistant didn’t seem as if it would be on his agenda.

When he seemed to possess no thoughts of ejaculating outside of you, you whimpered, which was as much resistance as you could spare.

His entire form tensed around you, crushing you and emptying you of the air in your lungs. Every muscle pulled taut he roared as if a dying beast, swearing and cursing your name. Pushing himself with one ragged thrust, deep inside of you, he came, releasing a sticky hotness into your core. He groaned, draining all of himself into you. It was strangely satisfying, feeling his seed fill you. He forced another handful of strokes into you.

You lost yourself in a moment of bliss before dread came washing over you. As he turned you to lay supine, leaving you, you begged to know why he had come inside you.

“I’ll buy you the morning after pill on the way to work tomorrow morning,” he nonchalantly drawled. You were left without words.

He shed his shirt over the pile of discarded garments, fixing his briefs.

Hovering over you, he snatched you into his arms before standing again. Legs wrapped around him, arms circling his neck, you latched onto him, overcome with a sudden need to be close, a need to be held and loved. With one hand he relieved the aching in your back with a firm massage.

“You were smart signing that contract,” he husked in your ear, “you no longer have to run away. No one can touch you when you’re mine.” It was said without affection, possession the dominant tone in his declaration.

With you in his arms, he slipped under the sheets, your body straddling his from above.

“You did well,” he commended. So well, he mused that he wanted you every day and all night.

His arms wandered your back, massaging your hips, your arms and your sore thighs; they twitched at his touch, melting into him.

...

You roused to deep, quiet breaths falling against your ear. The room was dark, a thin stream of gold falling from above the canvas, though it lifted nothing. There was an unfamiliar man before you on your bed, his wild fringe dishevelled over an alabaster complexion, his eyes closed. You could feel a mugginess grasping at skins, though cold air brushed your face.

Then it struck you, this wasn’t your bed, or perhaps now it was. The previous night’s depraved escapades freshened in your memory, pouring into conscious thought; mortifying you.

You could still feel _him_ sticking between your inner thighs, soaking into the sheets. There was so much of _him_ ; inside you.

There was guilt and fear, though you couldn’t bring yourself to feel remorse; you didn’t regret it.

Is screwing your boss ahead of your first day of work moral depravity, or was it merely a societal faux pas? Would you be branded for this if anyone found out; would he, or had he already branded you? Was this now an expectation of you? These were the queries which consumed your thoughts, ravaging your mind.

You knew - at least on his part - that there were no feelings involved, emotions were never a factor in these relationships. You were well acquainted with its dynamics; you had observed the steady stream of women frequenting your late brothers’ residences. The realization of what you had - willingly - made yourself to be, stung. Those women had always been beneath you.

Your mind travelled back to the white collared shirts and tailored suits hanging with immaculate precision in the walk-in closet. Conniving bastard, this is what he had planned to make of you all along. This wasn’t your apartment he was so generously bestowing upon you, this was - among many other things - yours to share. You had always understood there would be an additional price, though not always had you known it would be this steep. In hindsight, you scorned yourself, what else could you have offered him in exchange?

He would saunter in here when he pleased, have his way with you, perhaps even spend the night at his whim, then leave you. He would return two nights from then, or even immediately the next night, and repeat the routine as he desired.

So, was this still a better alternative; becoming the young CEO’s plaything in the most literal sense of the definition?

His eyes fluttered open, revealing indicolite blue. They seem to glow on their own, even in the absence of light, or perhaps they were reflecting the city lights which stole in from below. They flickered against your own, before a smirk curled his lips. Wordlessly, his arm drew you against his chest, your lower halves tangling further.

 

”Enjoying yourself?”

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No seriously. Let me know what you think of the development.
> 
> Oh by the way, almost forgot: 
> 
> Apartment bedroom: https://pin.it/exofgyomphzitv


	8. How To Keep A Billionaire

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... fair warning, from a moral stand point and a self-respect/dignity stand point, most of you will hate it. She’s essentially down to be whatever he needs her to be and it’s a very different character from the gun, conglomerate and husband handling reader from the other fic. Things will change, the relationship will grow to be less toxic.

 

  
“Enjoying yourself?” he purred in your ear. It had been spoken with such condescension that you believed a response would only legitimize the hierarchy he was constructing. He pressed his lips against your ear. “Hungry?”

“A little,” you mumbled.

“Get me my phone from my suit jacket.”

Pulling apart from him, you slipped your hand blindly into the many pockets his suit jacket concealed before retrieving his phone. You handed it to him.

“It’s me,” he announced to whoever. Mentioning your name he continued, “Have two of my usual delivered to her apartment.”

As you listened to him speak, the escalation of your intimacy with the young president, who you found as agreeable as an aneurysm; how severe a slope it has been was disconcerting. Dressing for work earlier that evening, that you would end it in his embrace, willingly ravaged by him, you would have seen as plausible as time travel.

The unspoken arrangement you had consented to was plain; he would care for you on a materialistic level, provide you guard from your pursuers and in exchange you would be his kept woman. To avert the prying and suspicious gaze of society’s eye, you would masquerade as his right hand, but only when the world was looking.

It seemed that of the ways you could afford to live a life of luxury, they all required numbing your sense of dignity to some degree. So, you posed yourself the question again, which was worth the sacrifice? You had decided it was this one.

Leading the life of a commoner was much too daunting, living diligently was overrated; it was ultimately, a euphemism for living poor. That the need to choose between buying a textbook and buying toothpaste had existed had never agreed with you, though then again, neither had calling someone sir. Perhaps both those particularities were derived from the same place of privilege.

Bow your head, you urged yourself as he clambered to hover over you, his lips crushing against your neck and jaw, raw welts mounding in their wake; give him what he wants and tell him what he wants to hear. There were worse realities. So your arms encircled his neck, fingers disappearing in his hair. You allowed a small smile to grace your lips, a content titter escaping into his ear.

“I didn’t realize you were this obsessed with me,” he taunted, inhaling deeply against your ear. “You did a good job hiding it.”

You offered him the practiced smile as he lifted to appraise your response.

“And yet it was you who always came looking for me,” you teased, lifting yourself to steal a kiss from his lips.

A cunning smirk turned up his lip. “What made you think I came for you?”

“You called the food subpar at best and unpalatable at worst. Besides, the richest man in the country dining there never made sense.”

“And the richest man in the country would come to visit a waitress?”

“He slept with her.”

His Lucifer smirk dimmed, though not an indication of his discontent. Your defiance earned his teeth against the soft skin of your neck, his lips leaving sloppy messes of kisses trailing down, past your collarbone, mouth closing over your breast. Your fingers curled in his hair, and after a teasing stroke of his tongue against your elongating nipple his lips, he released you, the suction escaping with a noisy pop.

As he left you, alone on the bed, through the defences of your resolve, your conscience began questioning your position. It was as if the adrenaline high had dissolved; in fact, that was exactly what had happened. Soreness numbed your lower half, spasms splintering through the paralysis, reminding you of long forgotten sensations besides pain.

So this was what losing your virginity feels like, you mused, suddenly possessing an image to paste on a long-elusive and vague concept. It hurt, a lot.

You wondered if the aching could be attributed to the fact that it was your first time, or whether it was the result a well-endowed man against a petite frame would always produce. You sincerely hoped not.  
  
...

Kaiba answered the door in a navy robe loose over pinstripe pajama pants. An older gentleman in a dark suit was invited into the residence. He appraised you with a quizzical brow, and at least to some extent you imagined, derision.

Sitting on a gold stemmed barstool against the glossed onyx kitchen counter, your present attire; Kaiba’s white, collared shirt served you as a dress, and while it concealed what it needed to, it shared loudly the affairs of the night and may have even stood to brand you as one of his possessions. Likely not having anticipated the night to have unfolded thus, he had not considered appropriate night wear for you.

Clasping your hands on your lap, your cascading, damp hair a poor substitute for a disguise to mask your face, and more importantly your disturbed expression, you could feel pins and needles of insecurity pricking your curved back. Having been discovered, you couldn’t seem to straighten your back and hold up your head in the presence of his employee. You weren’t proud of your affair, but you wouldn’t betray your decision. Still, in that moment you had comprehended how mortifying it had the capacity to be; should the affair be disclosed to the public.

As the man Kaiba had addressed as Isono left, you slipped around the marble counter in search of plates.

“What are you looking for?” his gruff voice inquired, having observed your exploration of the kitchen, opening and closing one pantry door after another.

“Plates,” you told him. The next over head door revealed what you had sought, and with strained fingertips you reached for the China.

He materialized behind you, his well-toned and bare chest under the open robe pushed against your back. Slender fingers retrieved two plates, his face intentionally pressed against your temple.

He was prolonging the moment. Why did he smell so damn good?

Then in an instant, he had spun back around to sit, his expression impassive; the plates set down on the counter beside the gold plated sink.

Returning to your seat to his right, you began unpacking the brown paper bag with embossed, gloss black writing across, reading some French restaurant you could summon no familiarity for. He appeared to have been waiting for you despite not having spoken the command.

Setting your cutlery down on to the marble on either side of your half eaten bœuf bourguignon, you inhaled. He seemed to be monitoring your manners, you had noticed in your nervous peripheral. They were perfect, he could find no flaw, obviously, though you worried perfection would be your undoing. Not that you knew any other way to dine.

He too paused as you did.

“Your family,” he ambushed in inquiry, in a tone so placid that it was eerie, “your father, what does he do?”

Your sharp tongue, being the quick striking blade it was whetted to be, forgetting in its haste the diplomacy which was meant to accompany it hand in hand, surpassed thought. “Did the background check not tell you, Mr. Kaiba?”

The accusation did nothing to the young man’s apathy, his expression remained frozen. The only discernible change contrary to this was his lip curling with confidence.

He set down his knife and fork. Neither was facing the other, both having silently decided that your peripheral afforded adequate clarity. He was the first to violate this, subjecting your profile to intense scrutiny under steel blue eyes.

“Understand miss,” he spoke your surname with a sibilant hiss, “that if I apply myself to it with even the slightest effort, there is no stone on this planet that could remain unturned. I am, given the nature of our relationship, and history, affording you a chance to tell me yourself, before I resort to the former.”

“What exactly is the nature of our relationship, Mr. Kaiba?” you dared to venture, turning to face him; nearly flinching as you connected with his gaze, “and what history do we share past a few weeks?”

For a moment, you grew certain he wouldn’t reply. “Your father,” he repeated calmly, “what does he do?”

“He’s a drunkard,” you responded without reservation, “I have broken bones and scars to prove it, though I’m sure you’ve already seen the latter. I no longer have my mother, and as for my brother, well, let’s just say he’s lost himself following in my father’s footsteps.”

The young chairman’s eyes narrowed, whether with skepticism or understanding you couldn’t be sure.

“Only one brother?” Kaiba questioned after much consideration.

“Yes, only the one.”

Silence reigned following that short lived discussion as you both resumed dinner, and he seemed to possess no mind to answer the question you had posed. And thus, the nature of your relationship; his interpretation, which you saw as the only legitimate interpretation given he was the one in control, remained elusive, as did his vague reference to shared history.

“I need to tell you,” you heard yourself confess, “this...all of this, it’s too much. I don’t know what came over me, but I can’t stay here, and I think you know that.”

“No,” he sharply disagreed, “it isn’t. I will not tolerate you living in that rat hole.”

“It was more than tolerable,” you lied.

“I seriously doubt that,” he scoffed. “Besides, it’s more convenient for me here. I rather not have to take you to a hotel each time I need you.” The last he wanted was a scandal; he had his corporation, and reputation to concern himself with.

“So that is what I am,” you confirmed grimly, audible enough to be heard, though it had been intended for yourself.

“What?” his voice snapped as if a dry tree branch in late autumn.

“Your kept woman, one of them anyway.”

“That implies I have others,” he snarled. “I don’t.” He didn’t know why he had felt the need to indulge you with that information.

This, you wouldn’t deny pacified you to some extent. He didn’t wish to be seen in public with you, sure; the cut of your clothe wasn’t marriage material to a billionaire, especially not one of the most powerful men in the world, but as if it was some consolation, it was a relief to know you weren’t sharing him, at least in that moment.

“I see.” The twist of your lip as it curled to a demure smile did not go unnoticed.

...

Why was he maintaining you in such a lavish manner, you wondered as the mattress shifted under his weight across the bed.

He didn’t seem the type to hold his lover, much less cuddle. You had misjudged. Built arms swept you into him, holding you against the soft rises and falls of his bare chest. Your legs tangled in the silk of his pants.

“Take this off,” he husked in your ear, and it was hypnotic compulsion which animated your fingers to oblige, undoing one by one, the buttons of his shirt. As the fabric fell open, he slipped the garment past your shoulders, discarding it somewhere past the edge of the bed. “This,” he purred, “is the only state acceptable for you to be in when you’re with me.”

His voice was velvet, and you could find in yourself no objections.

...

You couldn’t be sure what had roused you. Kaiba was standing over the bed, a Prussian blue tie, a shade lighter than his navy suit, sat tucked undone, under the collar of his light blue shirt. He didn’t seem the type to wear pocket squares, so it always surprised you to see the silk peeking out from his breast pocket; this time an ivory hue.

The world beyond the glass cage was pitch black.

“Good morning. I see you’re finally awake,” he remarked, “it’s half five.” You allowed a moment for the arrangement to refresh in your mind. “You’re supposed to be up before me,” he rebuked, “but since it’s your first day, I’ll let it pass. I won’t allow it here after, is that clear?”

You nodded blearily, attempting to register all the words he spat in rapid succession.

“Do you know how to tie a tie?” He stressed his question with an arched brow.

You had learnt how to as a child as your uniform had required it. It was like learning to ride a bicycle, you convinced yourself, it was probably impossible to forget. Again, you nodded.

“Then come tie this, make yourself useful.”

That insult was unexpected and for its suddenness, crippling. It required a moment to swallow. Recovering from the contemptuous remark, you swung your legs over the edge of the bed; the bareness of your thighs under the black silk a reminder of your present state of undress. Clutching the comforter closer to your chest, you met his flinty gaze.

“Nothing I haven’t seen,” he snapped. “Get over here.”

Allowing the silk to slip away from your prickling skin, you stood exposed before him, toes curling against the carpet. He may have seen it many times over, but that would do nothing to discourage his gaze from ravaging you. Averting your gaze to scrutinize the carpet fibres, you ambled to stand a hairsbreadth away from his, eyes never lifting to meet his, while your fingers wove the long strip of fabric over and under. His breath broke in hot waves against your cold skin, naked to his touch.

After a few moments of what had begun seeming as if it was a mastered technique, quickly exposed itself to be a sham; your memory failing you. You would eagerly blame this on the young chairman’s wandering hands on your naked body; slender fingers tracing your contours, and groping without reserve your bare ass. His predatory eyes watched you intently, unwilling to miss even the slightest spasm and jerk his hands ripped from your body.

“I’ll teach you to tie one next time,” he rasped, persuading you to give up the assignment by walking you backwards to the bed. He clambered over you as the bed broke your willing fall.

You heard the dull clang of his belt buckle, and the rustle of his dress pants and briefs being tugged down enough for his arousal to spring free. The next you knew he was parting you, inside you, arms coiling against your back; his grunts filling your ear. Your raw walls clenched him as he gouged you. 

“My god,” you gasped, reedy, piping moans escaping you in response to the sensations his erection forced into you. There was friction...delicious, rugged friction. Your nails dug into his back over his suit jacket.

As he released himself into you; burning liquid sloshing into your core, he held on to you for a fleeting moment before standing to his usual, imposing height. Then entirely dispassionate, he buckled his belt and tied his neck tie into a perfect knot. Straightening the knot, he turned on his heel, disappearing into the closet.

Returning within moments, he tossed a black feathered skirt, black silk camisole and black, oversized blazer at you.

“You’re wearing that,” he asserted. “I prefer stilettos and no bra. And do something about those bruises on your neck, I don’t need you announcing to my secretaries what we do in here.”

Gathering the sheets into your fists in a bid to calm yourself, you offered him a small bow of your head, sitting up. Someday, you wished he would marry a girl who would have him wrapped around her finger and rolling under her heel.

...

The second time he had his way with you that morning, he afforded you no time to change, hardly sparing the decency to allow you to slip back up your black lace panties which had pooled to your ankles, before storming out of the apartment.

As you scurried after him, both his height and the incline of your Loubiutins working against your favour, your cellphone; which at present was the only personal belonging you had salvaged from the previous night, began to vibrate. The caller ID read ‘unknown.’

“Hello?” you were hesitant to answer.

  
“Good morning, young madam,” a plummy voice wheezed. “Oh what a relief. I’ve finally found your number. Your father is very ill, and the situation at home is not looking very good. The head attorney thinks it would be best you return immediately.”

“Who is that?” Kaiba’s sonorous voice echoed in the corridor, startling you out of your skin. You lowered the phone from your ear. “You look as if you’ve seen a ghost.” He narrowed his gaze with suspicion.

“No, voice phishing, so convincing sometimes, you know?”

 

“I have no father,” you hissed into the phone as your boss stepped into the elevator ahead of you, “so it’s of no consequence to me if the old man croaks. You have the wrong number.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work outfit:https://pin.it/zfykzbr47t4ixf
> 
> Still, let me know what you think. Feel free to hate on her character for being easy, if you feel that way, or defend her if you think she has her reasons!


	9. One Knife In My Back, Two In Yours

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone, since all of you gave me a hard time about her personality shift, here’s a little behind her thought process and a little transformation - even if it lasts a short while, enjoy.

“I guess it is true what they say,” Kaiba drawled from beside you, appraising your reflection in the elevator doors as they closed, “fine feathers do make a fine bird.” It was an insult in every sense; from the words to the delivery. Not much of what left him; in the rare occasion he spoke, escaped the realm of being an insult. And had you possessed the liberty, you would have impaled his jugular with the most expensive pair of rock stud stilettos in your collection. Or not, perhaps social construct dictated that he was too handsome.

You were standing shoulder to shoulder - or shoulder to upper arm - tension pulled taut as silence reigned. Apparently, when not engaging in sexually depraved escapades, neither was inclined to entertain the other with small talk; him for obvious reasons, being a decent human being would betray his brand, and you, well, you could think of nothing of value to contribute which would not be thwarted by him on the first syllable. He only needed your voice when you were screaming his name.

As you slipped into the backseat of a black BMW, Kaiba closely behind you, in the rear view mirror you caught a glimpse of the man named Isono. He was silent as he greeted you with a slight nod, a pair of dark shades fixed to obscure his angular face. You returned the gesture stiffly, impatient to avert your gaze.

Kaiba then occupied himself with an incoming phone call, his gravelly voice droning on with abstruse technological jargon which was inconsequential to your role. The few exchanges pertaining to business you comprehended, though lacking context they too failed to retain your interest. On the subject of roles you were expected to play, Kaiba’s hand blindly sought your thigh where the skirt had hitched up by design, revealing more skin than you were comfortable with. Again, your eyes accidentally connected with Isono’s, before darting in opposite directions as if shot marbles. In silence, you had established a mutual understanding; he saw nothing and you said nothing. Kaiba ventured no further; absently palming your inner thigh as his baritone register grew to be a dull ring in your ear. Where his conversation grew tense, as did his fingers against your thigh, before they returned to rubbing his warm palm over the length of your exposed skin as if he was stroking a cat. It wasn’t affection; merely a distracted act of possession, or so you interpreted.

In the stretch of solitude his engagement afforded you, your thoughts briefly revisited the earlier phone conversation; justifying your reaction. It was of no consequence to you, the affairs of that family, you weren’t living off the good graces of their last name, or even your given name. As far as you were concerned, you were no longer a daughter of that household. You had afforded the old man what he had desired the greatest; his separation from you. What he couldn’t follow through with any conviction over a decade ago, when he abandoned you, his flesh and blood at an orphanage in a strange city, far removed from home, you were doing in his stead. You would think it as honouring a dying wish. You were already in mourning, you wryly remembered, eyes cast over the black ensemble, just not for him.

It was amusing, you considered, how fathers thought it acceptable to be absent for the greater part of their offspring’s childhood, and then summon them to do their bidding when fresh blood was required for sacrifice.

Your present circumstances would perhaps deter him from his quest to reclaim you and impose the family name, for your relationship to the elder Kaiba made you depraved and a disgrace in open society. It was pitiful how even now his strident voice rung clear in your consciousness, disdaining you for being the weak; easily preyed upon as he used to call it. Inadvertently your fingers curled against the hem of your skirt, suppressing brimming tears. And perhaps you were inept to survive. Who was he to judge how you chose to survive?

“What you requested Mr. Kaiba.”

A hollow package thrust in to your hand, followed by the driver’s door shutting tore your attention to reality. Peering down you studied the package of NorLevo on your lap.

You weren’t in the mood for this. Fuck this.

You couldn’t begin to fathom where the fission had begun; only when it ruptured. Why did you so conveniently choose this moment, in the _privacy_ of this man’s, as well as his employee’s company to time your mental collapse?

You had admitted to being many things within the past twenty four hours, however you would not be branded cheap. You hadn’t expected a serenade before being handed the contraceptives, though a degree more decency than having it slapped on your palms, you didn’t think too much of an imposition to ask for.

  
Ultimately it was the betrayal of self in everything you had surrendered to that had spurred the episode.

Knuckles burning white against the hem of your skirt, you silenced the sobs which accompanied the hot tears, head fallen forward. Beyond your peripheral, Kaiba motioned for Isono to allow you both privacy.

He spoke in the man’s absence.

“Did you want to get pregnant?” Kaiba questioned hotly.

“What?” you choked. “Of course not.”

“Then take it.” Retrieving a bottle of water from beside him, he held it out to you.

Your fingers twitched, nails scraping against the package in a sincere effort to peel the lid. Growing irritated with your fumbling, he snatched the box from your hands, dropping the bottle of Evian on your lap in the exchange. Piercing the bubble seal, he apprehended your wrist, placing the tablet on your open palm.

At your continued paralysis, he plucked the bottle from your lap, twisting the cap and forcing it into your free hand.

“I don’t have time for your snivelling this early in the morning,” he snarled. “I don’t know what this is about, but get it together.”

Perhaps it was the disparaging tone of voice which was hauntingly familiar, or the resulting humiliation, but you did exactly that. You composed yourself; wiping your tears you swallowed the contraceptive. Years of conditioning did wonders to the human emotional response.

“I’m sorry Mr. Kaiba, it won’t happen again.”

“See that it doesn’t.”

...

Walking through the lobby of Kaiba Corp. at the heel of the young CEO, the eyes of the employees fallen to ninety degree bows followed the echo of your heels and bare legs. You contrasted in a fashion which bordered scandalous, the bleak greys and washed out blues and khakis of the corporate garb which surrounded you. The fresh face attached to the corporation’s president by the hip would no doubt be a robust topic of conversation. You weren’t oblivious to the rush of hushed whispers below the iron curtain of silence your boss commanded.

If they only knew what you’ve done.

  
“Hold your head up,” Kaiba commanded as you left the elevator, walking the corridor which led to his office, “you’ll be training under one of my personal secretaries, but make no mistake, she answers to you, not the other way around.”

You supposed this wouldn’t be an appropriate occasion to inquire him for his reasons for hiring a girl with an incomplete undergrad to do his right hand bidding.

“Yes, sir.”

A step ahead of you, he stopped, turning on his heel to meet your gaze.

“Sir?”

“I’m sorry Mr. Kaiba, is that uncomfortable?”

“Not in the least,” he decided, a dark undercurrent in those words. It was the smirk which confirmed the insinuation.

...

Both the young women behind the tall oak reception situated across from his office doors rose, offering their greetings to the chairman. As they straightened from their bows, their eager gazes ghosted past him in your direction.

“Sayuri Yamagishi,” Kaiba drawled flatly, motioning towards the woman donning the light blue blouse with dramatic bishop sleeves, “my assistant secretary.” Her blonde hair with a cool touch of wheat cascaded forward as she bowed in greeting, despite being bound in a low ponytail by the nape of her neck. “And my secretary, Miyu Suzukaze.” She also mirrored the motions of the former. Her gaze, likely what she believed to be surreptitious, crept over the boundaries of her desk and poured over the lower potion of your ensemble, or the lack there of. Kaiba then proceeded to introduce you by full name, refreshing his secretary with previously discussed details of how your training period would be handled.

“Take good care of me,” you bowed in return, flashing a promising smile.

Grunting disinterestedly at the dynamic, the young CEO disappeared into his office; he would call on you when he needed you.

The latter young woman swept her sleek ebony hair straightened to a pin over one shoulder. “When he gave me his personal card and asked me to shop for a young woman at Mitsukoshi, I didn’t realize it was for you,” Miyu apprised with suspicion. “In any case,” she sighed, walking around the reception, her perfectly manicured hand outstretched, “welcome to the team.” In comparison to her immaculately glossed, blush tips, you felt a sudden surge of shame at your ragged nails, bitten out of nervous habit, as you met her hand with a firm shake.

She was impeccably dressed; no one could question her authority as Kaiba’s personal secretary in a fitted black dress, hem grazing below her knees, under a black blazer, cuffs rolled; the dismal palate offset by a silver, Swarovski necklace, the crystal encrusted pendant swinging past her chest.

The dynamic would be cold, she was quick to establish. When one was at the service of a man as irascible and neurotic as Seto Kaiba, you supposed it was necessary; you were all constantly on a precarious ledge.

“Your seat is behind here,” she advised, gesturing to the larger desk behind the reception. The young woman introduced as Sayuri curiously spun in her chair, observing the forced interactions. “I don’t understand why Mr. Kaiba suddenly needs an EA when he has two secretaries but well, there’s not really a role for you to play besides overseeing us, unless specifically requested by Mr. Kaiba himself.” If she only knew. “I will still train you in basic office procedures, including standard protocol for phones, official emails and managing Mr. Kaiba’s schedule along with his preferences as well his associates’.

“This is probably not the best morning to start considering there’s a partnership meeting with Kaito Holdings in half an hour.” Kaito Holdings, her words seized your train of thought. It was a Tokyo based company dealing in malware protection. You hoped no familiar face would be running around the branches of Domino, though then again, when meeting the president of Kaiba Corp. they would only send their best; given they had their own best interests in mind. Still, should the group’s chairman indeed be present, the chances of him recognizing his son’s former classmate was unlikely, you dismissed.

“What’s your deal?” Miyu’s irascible voice penetrated your thoughts.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Your skirt,” she enunciated a harsh ‘t,’ “is inappropriately short. I’m not sure what Mr. Kaiba had to say about it, but if hasn’t already, I would err on the side of caution and either change, or at least wear something more sensible tomorrow, and —” She attempted to peer between the lapels of your blazer, gaging how the flimsy fabric draped your form, though had she noticed you wore nothing beneath the camisole, she made no comment of it. “— those heels, Loboutins? Again, not the most work appropriate. You’re giving off the wrong impression. I’m telling you this for your own good. Believe me,” she said, walking around her seat and assuming her previous attitude, “you rather hear it from me than him.”

You wondered if Kaiba would appreciate his personal secretary’s harrowing critic of his styling choices. You would find out.

“The EAs have all the perks,” Sayuri chimed in, “I didn’t get a whole new wardrobe courtesy of his personal card.”

Huh, you mused, personal card. That’s an interesting detail.

“I think he just found my own wardrobe tragic,” you laughed nervously, trying to diffuse the mounting suspicion with humour. The real tragedy were their reactions. Their faces remained entirely impassive and unaffected. Tough crowd.

“About that,” Miyu voiced, “what’s your deal?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“What’s your deal?” she repeated, expression contorted with ire. “You’re a college student, right? And as far as I’m concerned, you have no experience in office administration. So what exactly is your deal that you landed a job at the best company in the country to work for, before graduation, directly under who is possibly the most ruthless man on this side of the continent?”

Your eyes fell over your smooth-wooded desk, surfaced perfected with a warm gloss. Inhaling once, they lifted. “Ground rules,” you asserted smiling, bringing your palm flat against the desk for effect, “let’s establish some.” The secretary’s proud stare wavered, while the righteous expression of the other faltered completely. You understood now that your unconventional lover’s words earlier that morning had been said with foresight, and received it as his permission to exert your authority. “I don’t do well with insubordination. If my skirt is too short, my superior will address it. If, as he is a man, and is unable to, Human Resources will. As neither has so far, it is not work appropriate for you to comment on your superior’s hemline. File a complaint if it bothers you. Two. Do not speak of Mr. Kaiba in a way which jeopardizes his reputation as president. He may be ruthless, but that’s unnecessary to vocalize. Old habits die hard, and such things sometimes slip in the presence of company. Three. No prattling. My experience is of no consequence to you as it only concerns the man who hired me, who, one would hope has better judgement than those working under him. Are we clear?”

Terse words of acknowledgement were muttered, before they motioned to return to their previously occupied posts.

“I see you’re settling in well,” Kaiba remarked, emerging from his office, amusement glinting in otherwise steely indicolite. “Suzukaze, Yamagishi,” he barked, “have the conference room prepared for the arrival of Kaito’s chairman. Take her with you.”

_Fucking lovely._

...

“President Kaito prefers jasmine tea,” Miyu informed, her disposition hostile following the altercation as she and Sayuri placed leather bound presentation briefing folders and pens around the oval conference table fitted with mics. “These are the sort of things you need to know in a secretariat position.”

You nodded distractedly, eyes gazing past the glass wrapped wall and at the faded pastels of the city, glistening with white morning sunlight.

Like son like father, you supposed, remembering your former classmate’s penchant for jasmine tea, or tea in general. His beloved metal tea flask had been a running gag in your year.

You excused yourself shortly after, frantic in your search for a washroom. As you dry heaved over the toilet you surmised the contraceptive Kaiba had forced you to take this morning likely had not agreed with you. Failing to empty the contents of your stomach, which likely was a good thing, with one final glance in the bathroom mirror, you navigated your way back.

A few steps forward and a jovial voice addressed you by your first name. Transfixed where you stood, you shuddered; there was a name you had not heard in a while.

“Turn around will you,” the familiar voice called. “I waited here for a good ten minutes trying to be sure.” He leaned away from the windowsill, straightening to his usual, wiry height. “What do you women do in there anyway?” he chuckled.

Fighting to glaze your eyes with indifference and feign composure as you turned to meet inquisitive hazel eyes, you imposed on yourself for a smile. Your lips twitched before falling flat into a straight line.

Saichi Kaito.

“Nice heels, your tastes haven’t changed. Long time no see stranger, I heard you ran away to join the circus. What the hell are ya doing here?” he queried informally.

“Senpai,” you acknowledged. “And you?” It was not a welcome reunion.

“My old man passed.”

“I’m sorry,” you offered.

“You should be,” he simulated indignation, “you didn’t come to offer your condolences.”

“I’m sorry.”

“And for your loss,” his voice grew somber.

You nodded in acknowledgment.

“They may not even be really gone.”

“Saichi.”

“Sorry,” he faltered, “that was insensitive of me. I’m sorry it happened so soon after your mother.”

“It’s fine, thank you for your consideration.”

“So back to my question,” he pressed, coming full circle.

You had nothing to say, though that had hardly discouraged you before.

“I’m interning under the asshole, what does it look like?”

He seemed to bite. “Does your father know?”

“Sure.”

“Try fooling a ghost,” he snorted, “your old man hates the Kaibas. And here I thought it ran in the family. What are you really doing here, stealing company secrets?”

You grappled his forearm, yanking him by his suit jacket sleeve through the doors leading to the stairs. In the isolation of a quiet corner of the staircase, you calculated his expression.

“My father doesn’t know I’m here,” you clenched your jaw, “and you won’t tell him. If it’s money you want -”

“What is it with your kind and money?” he interrupted, a growl of displeasure rolling in his throat. “I don’t want your money,” he clarified, “though you and Kaiba are perfect for each other in that regard. Just make sure this deal follows through smoothly, and I won’t mention a word to Seto Kaiba.”

“I don’t have that kind of influence.”

Saichi scoffed, “I find that hard to believe.”

“Fine,” you conceded in a hush, “but you better make good on your promise because for every knife in my back I put two on yours. You know that don’t you Saichi?”

“Perfectly,” president Kaito smiled.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you think. Theories are welcome! I live for conspiracies.
> 
> Side note: Mitsukoshi is one of Japan’s oldest department stores. It’s also frequented by the more affluent.


	10. Silver Spoon Vs. The Golden Spoon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! I actually don’t know what to say here or even where I left off in the last notes except ooh! If you didn’t catch the announcement on my other fic, I’m co-authoring a story of Priest/Pharaoh Seto with Est called Kingdoms of the Sun, so if you’re into ancient love lines and throwing nations under the bus for personal gain and all of that good stuff, check that out! We just felt there was a dire shortage of Ancient Seto fics. 
> 
> Enjoy!

With a hardened gaze, you repeated your name.

“What?”

“My name Saichi, don’t call me by what you did earlier.”

“What is that? Your middle name strung together with...what’s with that last name — are you honouring your mother or something?” Then an epiphany of sorts seemed to spark behind calculating eyes. “Does Kaiba even know who you are? I recall you put up a fuss avoiding the media like the plague.”

“Grandmother. And I don’t like having my picture taken. So what? As if there’s anything that douche wouldn’t know. _He_ knows. How else would I have landed a position as his EA? My father doesn’t, we’ve already established this Saichi, _try_ to keep up. You think he wouldn’t have tracked me down with my real name?”

“Kaiba does have a penchant for pissing off your old man. I suppose this makes sense.” A rogue smirk lit up his face. “Are you sleeping with him?”

You would only be transfixed for a moment. “I want to piss off the old man but not to that extent,” you calmly denied.

“Makes you wonder if Kaiba is interested in women at times like this,” he said, sparing a glance over your whole form. “Working late nights with you in an office alone, I can’t speak for him but speaking as a man it would be hard to keep my — _hands_ to myself.”

“Keep it in your own pants,” you warned. “Don’t acknowledge me at the meeting. It may hurt your chances. I think I’ve already pissed him off this morning.”

Turning to walk away, you spared him a glance over you shoulder. “Oh, and my kind Saichi?” He watched you with skepticism nestled between his brows. “I didn’t realize we were all that different...silver spoon bastard.”

The unsuspecting president faltered at the remark, clearing his throat. If anything, you acknowledging him as your kind was an undeserved honour in the eyes of anyone who knew you.

...

Observing the severely pained expression marring your face, from the head of the conference table Kaiba fixed you with an unambiguous grimace announcing his irritation. He was unimpressed, evidently. Seated to his right, you imagined your face was painted several shades of green; your body had a few choice words for the contraception pill, and it was threatening to make them known all over the table.

You would only lower your gaze in response.

Swallowing thickly, you met Saichi’s glare from the opposite end of the room. Noticing, you came under Kaiba’s scrutiny for a different reason.

“If you went to school with the youngest of Kageyama Corporation,” he inquired with skepticism spread generously over your claim, “wouldn’t that clown have been your senior?”

“He was,” you agreed, apprehensive of his motives in the face of this sudden curiosity though he would pursue it no further.

The two secretaries led several sharply dressed women from the secretariat with trays of various fragrant tees and coffee for the directors of the two boards, and for a moment, you found yourself wondering why Kaiba had reached so far for you when he had all of this at the stretch of a finger.

The negotiations passed behind a haze of nausea ravaging your composure, subsequently placing you on the receiving end of a string of coma inducing glares your boss was notorious for. The blood must have drained completely from your face at some point convincing Kaiba you would flat line on him right there in the board room because under a sibilant hiss, he slid his half drunken cup of coffee past the glass of water you had drained.

You didn’t care for black coffee, in fact, you couldn’t palate the espresso overloaded, dry sludge he ingested, though you supposed he needed to source the heart attacks he doled out somewhere, and perhaps the shock from caffeine injected raw grinds would be enough to flush some blood back into your complexion, so in one forced swallow you finished his cup.

The notes you jotted of what was exchanged in conversation and the comments made for improvement on the proposal were pitifully illegible, and had you voiced an opinion on the subjects discussed, you imagined your voice would have resembled your handwriting.

At the end of the affair, as Kaiba gripped Saichi’s outstretched hand in a crushing shake, the latter’s eyes drifted to you. “Mind if I borrow your bombshell for a minute?”

“Watch it Kaito.” Kaiba’s eyes narrowed at the address; the possessive side step he made unconsciously, lost to two of the three parties in contention. “I don’t recall a high school reunion being on my agenda.”

“I don’t recall inviting you Kaiba, I just asked for your assistant.”

“And I’m asking you to do it on your own time,” Kaiba growled in retaliation.

Your fingers delicately wrapping around his forearm, you implored with a gentle nod to allow it. With gathered brows he strode away, and you followed Saichi out of the board room, congregating in a quiet corner of two adjoining corridors of glass.

“You’re totally shagging him,” he said releasing an impish laugh before he had even turned to face you. That wicked grin you could have seen through the back of his head. “Don’t think I didn’t see how you drank from his cup,” he continued his assault before you could even defend yourself from the first. “Don’t think anyone in that boardroom missed that — and before you even deny it, what was that just now? That...that arm grab. You know he had the face of a man who didn’t want another touching his woman. So I conclude, you’re shagging him.”

“Interesting soliloquy, do you ever get sick of your own fiction?”

“You have your father’s poker face,” he said chortling. “Impressive. Or should I say your boyfriend’s?”

“Saichi...” you growled in warning, suppressing the intense impulse to relieve your turning gut.

“Your father is so going to behead you and lock you up in a tower.”

“What did you need to speak to me about?”

“Are you feeling alright? You look like you’re going to he sick — has he already gotten you —”

“Saichi.” Second warning.

“Just wanted to refresh you on our deal —”

“Don’t test me. I’m not an idiot.”

“Whatever you say,” he sang. “Though I wonder how your father will feel about having a Kaiba tainting the bloodline. As far as I’m concerned the only blood your old man wants to see from him is — ”

“Shut it.” You ground your teeth, apprehending him by the lapel of his suit jacket. “Don’t push me Saichi, can you really afford to have me as your enemy?”

“Is that a threat?”

“Was I being ambiguous?”

“I don’t care to find out.” His jovial expression eclipsed with sudden soberness. “Just get the contract signed, or daddy will get a phone call telling him what his daughter has been up to courtesy of me.”

Unknowingly, he was threatening you with one crown of thorns you didn’t want to wear.

“Is this what years of knowing each other has come to?”

“What did you tell me back then?” He attempted to recall. “The ends justified any and all means in business?”

“And they will,” you maintained the bluff, “just make certain the ends are in your favour.”

“Wouldn’t it be mutual?”

“I’m not talking about the battle, I meant the war. You don’t want daddy’s company to be acquired courtesy of me. I have a knack for making people...and things disappear.” You had managed it so well on yourself until this clown had made an appearance.

Biting his lip he offered a conceding smile as you released him. “So want to grab a drink sometime?”

“Sometime. I’ll call you.” You spun on your heel, walking away.

“Like that’ll ever happen,” he scoffed.

You shot him a glance over your shoulder. “No, I wouldn’t be caught dead with a guy who thinks turtle necks and leather jackets are the solution to every occasion. Stick to that suit, it’s matches the hell out of that combover situation.” You twirled your finger in abstract swirls motioning for his hair.

“Not a combover, it’s nineteen thirties inspired!”

“Right, and my last name is actually my family name.”

...

“Lock the door behind you.”

With a tentative glance over your shoulder at the speculating secretaries congregated as if a committee prepared to dole out a verdict for a scarlet letter to be stitched to your lapel, you followed after the brooding president into his office. Apparently isolation with him behind closed — locked — doors was a crime punishable by death stares.

Before the rotating lock fell into place he was having an aneurysm. “What the hell were you playing at?”

“I beg your pardon? ...I — I don’t know which — what —”

“All of it.” He ground his jaw. He had turned completely away from the window by now.

“I don’t know what you mean.” Kaiba motioned you over with a cross flick of his eyes.

“What did you think of the proposal Kaito made?” He posed the question settling into his seat, leaning forward against steepled fingers.

You could only stutter as you assumed a seat across from him. Not much had permeated your conscious stream do thought from the exchange.

“You weren’t listening.”

“I wasn’t feeling myself,” you defended.

“I don’t care for your excuses,” Kaiba hissed your surname. You couldn’t recall the last time he had addressed you by last name, if ever. Somehow he had managed to draw a border even more impersonal, designing a raised tier of hostility you didn’t imagine possible in the tilted nature of your relationship. “I expect you to represent my corporation with the utmost merit, and by extension represent me as my executive assistant. You looked like you would die on me in the boardroom then you gallivanted off with the rivalling corporation’s president. What image do you think you’re portraying to people of the executive management of this company?” His voice continued to be a sibilant hiss condemning you for all the failures he had set you up for.

“If you recall,” you replied, voice a dangerous harbinger of tears which refused to afford him the satisfaction, “I did not want nor did I ever ask for this position. This position is just a glorified bullet fodder for the media and the general public so you can get in between my legs without ruining your precious reputation with a scandal.” He motioned to interrupt though his lips promptly sealed to a thin line. “I look like a resuscitated corpse because of the contraceptive you forced down my throat. I don’t know if you realize that severe nausea is a side effect of this type of pill. Again, I wouldn’t be heaving my guts up if you didn’t — ”

“Sleep with you?” His voice held a petrifying quality of somber. “I didn’t realize it repulsed you so much. You have no obligation to sleep with me.”

“We both know that’s not true though to say sleeping with you repulses with me isn’t...isn’t what I meant. I’ll do my due diligence by studying the contract proposed. If you want my recommendation or review from my limited experience, then I’ll have that compiled for you by the end of the day. ”

“I don’t need your recommendation,” Kaiba spurned, “I’ve been writing these contracts since you were four years old. Though it certainly wouldn’t hurt to make yourself useful.” You recognized the whetted edge in his tone. To some degree it was distinctive to him; but he possessed the capacity to be softer.

Your definition of being _useful_ to him varied a great deal from what he was establishing here. Being useful to him always came with the aftertaste of his musky sweat and the image of twisted sheets. Being useful to him always carried the connotation of opening your legs and having lungs full of burning air. Being useful in the context of analyzing contracts seemed exceptionally mundane.

Rising from your seat he reminded you had not been dismissed. Tracing your fingertips around the outermost edge of his mahogany desk, you meandered to stand in front of him. You had inspired his ire, and reparations, you told yourself, needed to be made to ensure your continued survival. He certainly wasn’t an offensive sight to seduce.

Turning in his chair he made no motion to object as you shed your blazer. He remained impassive still as you fell forward, anchoring your knee between his thighs. You stopped short of your lips grazing his Cupid’s bow.

“You have some nerve, after that speech.” Kaiba met your gaze with a curled lip.

“I’m trying to make amends aren’t I?”

“That you are,” he conceded, wrapping two fingers around your chin, pressings his warm lips against yours. The fervour of the kiss burned rapidly and you found yourself on his lap with your hands in his hair. His fingers were splayed across your back.

He made you believe you didn’t need air, until like with everything else surrounding the man, he ended the heated affair on his own terms, and asked you disinterestedly to get off.

His secretary would be here soon with lunch.

You had been quite surprised when his highness had abandoned his throne in favour of the sofa for lunch. From how the secretary’s eyebrows had climbed three inches when he announced his intentions, it appeared it was not a regular occurrence. Of course it was difficult to discern her surprise from the irritation sputtering like hot butter on a burning pan, though from how pointedly she set down your crab alfresco, almost as if to dig the container into the wooden surface of the coffee table, at least you could confirm she wanted to twist a knife in your gut.

You relaxed your fingers from the tight ball they had withdrawn to under her impeccably glossed manicure. “I thought I was supposed to take care of your lunch?” you inquired as the door clicked shut.

“It’s within your realm of duties, yes,” Kaiba said, “though I’m sure we can both agree there’s better uses for your time.”

“I see.”

Mind lagging, your eyes lingered over him for a moment longer than you had intended to, before returning to the aforementioned contract open on your lap, which had been the topic of bitter contention earlier; mirroring his detached composure.

Unexpectedly, between the two, he was the first to disturb the silence. “You haven’t touched your lunch.”

“I’m sort of lactose intolerant,” you explained.

“Sort of?”

“Mildly. Usually it doesn’t bother me but with how I’ve been feeling this morning I’m not looking to aggravate it.”

“You should have said something.” His tone wasn’t brimming with irritation; he didn’t sound inconvenienced, and while a master of masked presentation, if you had annoyed him, he would have held no hesitation in making you aware. It was strange the contentment which found you at the insignificant detail — or perhaps not having your head bitten off in one clean go after constantly teetering on the edge triggering his notorious wrath warranted such a reaction.

Without looking, one hand glued to the keyboard, with his other he slid the chopped steak salad he had been picking at across to you. Having anticipated your deer in headlights reaction he turned to face you with a tired sigh. “Eat it.”

“But it’s — ”

“It’s mine? Yes clearly. If you’re concerned of it being contaminated or something equally ridiculous, need I remind you that your mouth has already been all over mine.”

The crude dysphemisms he used for intimacy was always difficult to digest, and knowing you were the party involved was disparaging. Yet the gesture was difficult to overlook, regardless of how he had arrived at the decision.

“Then at least have mine instead,” you said.

Wordlessly he obliged, eyes drifting with suspicion to how precisely you held the lunch box, fingers crooked awkwardly, so as to not expose to him your fingernails. Accepting the box his scrutiny quickly shifted to your clenched fingers. Apprehending your wrist, he undid your fist.

“You — ”

“Don’t,” you interrupted him, recoiling in his grip though he held on.  
“I believe I made it clear presentation was critical. Have that fixed after lunch,” he said, slapping his card against the table.

“I’ll have them filed at home.” You disconnected your gaze from commanding sapphire.

“I wasn’t brainstorming ideas. I prefer blue.”

...

You could not have justified footing an eighty-six thousand yen cheque for a manicure, though Kaiba seemed unperturbed. Appraising them with a keen eye as you returned his card, he seemed content, pleased even, which was a rare expression to encounter on his face, if ever.

The ice blue manicure mid-work-day caused a stir with the secretaries — three other young women from the secretariat in tow — holding some pretentious assembly in front of Kaiba’s office in his momentary absence on their latest rankings of male actors, which apparently included their boss.

From the archive office behind the secretary’s desk you could hear the buntings, their prattling an indecisive mess of desperation to seduce Kaiba mixed with an acute trauma of him. You almost commended them for their bravery — read: lack of self-preservation — in discussing all the potential women in his repertoire right in front of his office — former secretaries mostly — before concluding the unlikelihood of such a stuck up ever being involved with any woman below his social ranking. You imagined this was not the first instance this discourse had been played out, it felt well practiced; routinely. Actresses and idols they could never strive to reach the tax bracket of, they arrived at a consensus, was more plausibly his ideal woman. How he avoided scandals, they agreed, was a miracle.

The conversation then turned to you; this whole discussion had apparently been inspired by your nepotistic appointment. And while whether the order of the airheads intended for you to hear any of this exchange remained doubtful as they theorized the entire equation of your existence, they seemed to possess no scruples tearing to shreds your every aspect. The burning question? Were you sleeping with him? And the verdict? You wouldn’t make the cut.

  
...

Late nine, and you sat on the far corner of the office sofa from Kaiba staring intently as if to intimidate the laptop screen to blink first. Perhaps you had shared yourself with him too many times but that gaze was starting be feel appealing; dare you say even enticing. Now there was a disturbing thought.

“What do you think?” you asked him of your evaluation of the clauses.

“It’s certainly not terrible. But tell me, why is it that I get the feeling that you considered the terms in favour of Kaito?” He looked indignant.

“I don’t know what you mean.” Congratulations, you praised yourself, now you’re a certified pathological liar.

“Your verdict then?”

“With a few adjustments, I think the exchange could be very beneficial for us.”

“I see. Pass me that contract,” Kaiba muttered, one hand outstretched though his narrowed eyes kept focus, the other folded under his chin. Impatient as you sifted through the stack of documents, his eyes shot to you with irritation. Encountering your dishevelled form he changed his mind.

You handed him the leather bound file. His fingers first grasped at the edge of the emerald file, before with one swift tug, he had snatched you into him.

“Mr. Kaiba what are you doing — anyone could — ” Your voice still refused to produce itself about a submissive hiss.

“Seto,” he corrected peering down. “I believe I said you could call me that when you’re with me like this. Besides, everyone’s long gone home for the night.”

“You said I could call you that when — _here_?” You hurried to steady yourself off his chest.

“Does it make a difference?” he asked. “Whether in my office or in your apartment, they’re both places I own.” With this he leaned over, lifting your legs to stretch over the cushions with an arm under your knees; splaying you over the sofa. “I won’t be done with work anytime soon to take you home. Don’t make me wait.” It was in every sense threatening, and you couldn’t possess the courage, nor the consciousness to reject him.

It was a familiar sequence; your clothes found the floor while his stayed, and you would be lying if you said you didn’t shamelessly crave even an inch of his bare skin. “Seto...” you whispered, “take off your shirt...please.” His lips abandoned their ministrations against the soft skin over your clavicles.

“Why?” You couldn’t discern if the question was motivated by irritation or smug curiosity. Nonetheless he complied without further pursuit of an answer, unbuttoning the dress shirt slightly creased, and allowing it to hang open. And your splayed fingers wandered; everywhere and anywhere the restraints of his suit jacket and the contours of his body allowed. “Enjoying yourself?” he taunted, breath a hot whirlwind in your ear.

  
“Yes...”

He liked you like this.

...

You woke up to dimmed lights and sharp typing. There was draft brushing your shoulders — bare shoulders, wait, what? You sat up in a hurry; the navy trench coat draping your falling to your waist.

Kaiba distracted from his assault against his keyboard, removing his glasses; eyes squinted behind the frames.

“Put on your clothes,” he said, “so I can take you home.”

“I fell asleep here?” Gathering his coat against your exposed chest, you rubbed your bleary eyes.

“Yes, and insisted you needed five more minutes each time I tried to wake you up.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Five minutes,” he grunted, “and I’m out of here.”

...

You discovered your belongings from your old apartment sorted in a pile on the living room floor. Against the vastness of the residence, you were stunned by how little it looked like the entirety of a young woman’s personal possessions, and more the tattered essentials of some travelling nomad. It was almost heartbreaking. And at the end of a day you had defined as difficult, this was a centring affirmation of your decision, and by extension the principles you had adopted and sacrificed.

“Are you not going home?” you questioned as Kaiba slipped into bed beside you. He didn’t dispute your nightgown, falling on to his back with an arm folded over closed eyes.

“It’s two in the morning,” he said. “Let me get some sleep.” He had discovered from the previous night, he slept exceptionally well beside you.

“Your secretaries thought my outfit was too short. I don’t think they like me very much.” You too stared up at the ceiling, fingers woven over your stomach.

“That’s the idea.”

“I’ll do a better job tomorrow.”

“What part of let me get some sleep did you not understand?”

This was still the right decision.

...

He stayed over the following night, and the next night after that. His voracious appetite for sex would not be discouraged by much you learned; dismal weather, poor negotiations in the boardroom or increased irascibility. In fact the worse the mood, the more he craved it seemed. And your horizons continued to be broadened.

The contract with Kaito you felt was heading in a promising direction.

Shaving before the mirror of the bathroom he was inconveniencing himself to share, he hissed as his razor grazed the thin cut across his cheek you had left as an accidental memento from the previous night’s escapades. His forearms were etched with a similar pattern of old scarlet.

Your apologies had been met with dismissive grunts; you imagined if he wore them the same way a soldier did his battle scars. A stupid thought surely, but you could never be sure with men and their egos.

You left your musings, and unabashed gawking, as Kaiba dubbed it to answer the ringing phone on your night stand.

“One knife in your back two in mine?” the voice said with grim foreboding.

“Saichi? How did you get this number?”

“You’re about to find all three in yours after this stunt.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“The contract. Apparently your boyfriend doesn’t like brown nosers and strings pulled behind his back in business, which by his definition, I am, and I have. I wonder what gave him that impression. The only strings I pulled were with you.”

“Saichi I swear I didn’t — ”

“Right. I guess you aren’t sleeping with him after all, or if you are, you’re doing a shit job of it.”

“Let me talk to him! There must be some misunderstanding. He was so inclined to sign it!”

“How do you of all people not know how your kind conducts business?”

“Please don’t,” you implored.

“You’re about to find how I do business. Gold spooned bitch.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you think! 
> 
> Also, let us know if you do check out Kingdoms of the Sun. It gets lonely writing without hearing your guys’ thoughts! :)


	11. Level of Clearance

“Are you not going to ask? Why I refused to sign a perfectly good contract?” he asked, lips moving against your hairline. Your head was resting against his bare chest rising and falling; beginning to calm. “You’ve been carrying it around all day.”

If you looked up right now, you imagined you would see city lights in those whetted blue sapphire.

You shook your head. “You don’t like being double crossed. Or the feeling of it.”

“Exactly.”

“I wasn’t trying to. I would have gained nothing from it,” you said.

“I know,” Kaiba replied, absently stroking your hair, “lesson for next time.”

“Are you trying to discipline me?”

“I’m not your father,” he huffed.

“My father — you’re nothing like my father.” The sudden reminder of his existence was frightening; enough to make the blood run cold in your veins and set your breath aflame in your lungs with anxiety.

“It’s an expression.” He felt your spreading tension weigh against him.

You clung on tighter to Kaiba. You had not held your end of the bargain, so Saichi will. And your eyes wandered through the halls, those floors checkered with black and white marble; up the winding ivory staircase, through those doors closing on the line of a person’s life and death —

You winced as hot words were breathed into your ear. “What is it?”

“I can’t breathe.”

“That’s why I asked you if you were feeling alright.”

“It’s not the sex,” you quipped.

“Then what — ”

“If those men...from earlier...if they come for me again. ...Will you protect me?” It hurt every shred of your pride to voice such a question to such a conceited quality of man.

“I’ve already paid all of your tuition, I don’t make investments which put me at a loss, especially not before I get my return,” he said. “I couldn’t find the debt those men were after you for. If they come looking for you again, I’ll take care of that too.”

“They don’t care for your money,” you confessed. “They want me in the flesh.”

“How desperate were you for money that you would get mixed up with organ dealers?”

“What?” He had misinterpreted your euphemism, though perhaps this was favourable.

  
“I was desperate for a lot of things. I’ve numbed myself to a lot of things to be here.”

“You need to stop speaking in riddles,” he drawled, reaching for his phone on the nightstand behind you. “What do you want for dinner?”

...

Dinner was a silent affair. Your occasional questions or remarks were met with acknowledging grunts.

“Are you staying the night again?”

“Again?” His gaze lifted from his plate to encounter yours across the kitchen counter. His verbal response was unexpected.

“Yes I just meant — will you not be going home, you’ve stayed here the past four nights now. I mean — it’s not that you can’t, it’s just that...I — ”

“I thought you needed the company. Are you implying I leave?” He didn’t seem particularly offended by the potential suggestion. Then again, outside of intimacy, his expressions hardly elevated beyond dispassionate reservation.

“How could I?” you said smiling wryly. “This is your place as you’ve already pointed out. Though needed...?”

“Who was it that was asking for my protection just now?”

“Don’t look so smug,” you muttered under your breath.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“I’m not being smug. I’m doing as you’ve asked of me.”

“You’re — doing as...I’ve...asked?”

He parted his mouth, and you witnessed something trauma inducing brewing on his tongue, before his lips assumed the familiar line of indifference. “Yes.”

“I see.”

“If Kaito tries to give you a hard time. You come directly to me, do you understand? If he touches you he’s playing in my court.”

It was your turn to offer him an acknowledging hum.

...

Your forearms draped with the silk sleeves of your robe prickled as you wrapped them around his form from behind. If he stiffened at your touch, it was momentary, as he refocused his attention on the display of tie pins and cuff links carefully suspended in the glass cabinet centring the vast closet.

“Stop idling and go get ready,” he chided, sliding open the glass. You tentatively rested your cheek against his back. He had woken up before you again; showered, shaved, dressed and arranged for breakfast to be put on the table.

“Are you mad I woke up late?”

“If I was to waste my temper on something so trivial — ” he sighed, clipping his sentence short of the remark that would have added the ammunition. “It’s not like you haven’t done the exact same thing since day one. You do as you please regardless of what I say.”

“Sorry.”

“I don’t care for apologies,” he said, fixing a pair of navy stoned cufflinks to his shirt. He was yet to dispute your embrace. He didn’t need this long to pin a pair of cufflinks, though you would be none the wiser.

Over the past few days you had grown afraid; you had started noticing the most peculiar details about him. He was someone who would disappear from your life on his own terms, when you — his newest plaything — was no longer the shiniest model, and yet you recognized the smell of his shirts, the scent he left behind on his pillow, the subtle warmth of his skin when he held you. You liked it when he looked at you with soft eyes, too tired to focus into a hostile sharpness at the end of the work day. A temporary distraction was selfishly carving for itself a permanent space, and you didn’t know what you would when he was gone. And he would definitely leave, it would be delusional to believe otherwise. It was only a matter of when — how long was your shelf life in his sphere of intrigue?

He was a lot of things. He was the final barricade you had against your father’s repossessing rampage. Being his; it would be the only shelter. Being the Prime Minister’s daughter-in-law would do little to discourage or incapacitate your father.

Except, he didn’t want you.

...

“Do you coordinate your outfits with him in the morning or something?” Miyu opted for an unconventional greeting as you assumed your seat, remarking of your lace trimmed white slip under a silk lapelled, black blazer cinched at the waist with a leather belt narrowing to hanging tassels. The week had done little to ease her animosity, if anything, escalating tensions, though she had learned to contain her sentiments with better mastery.

“Only the outfit,” you returned, the honesty in the reply heavily masked with sarcasm. The man stirring this contention had worn a black suit with a white dress shirt. “The shoes I’m sure you can tell — ” you extended your leg out from under your desk, tilting the black heeled boots with metal chains wrapped across, so the polished leather caught the ceiling lights, “— don’t match his dress shoes.” You punctuated your sentence with an exaggerated smile. “Or maybe they do.” The expression drew steel screws into her eyes.

For the past three days, the matching had been done on purpose, at least on your part. It had not been a marking of territory, you would say; simply, he dressed before you always, and you burrowed outfit inspiration.

“People will talk,” she cautioned, turned away from you at her desk.

“People are already taking,” you said, “I mean you’re people, are you not? Or do you consider yourself a nobody?”

A tablet found itself with a thud on to your desk. “He has someone he’s seeing.”

“What?” Your eyes fell to pour over the tablet. “Meagan Miyazaki...seen together with...although Mr. Kaiba did not accompany the actress to the...he spent a considerable time conversing with...” Meagan Miyazaki, there wasn’t a person in Japan who would be unfamiliar with the half-American actress — American only by name and the handful of years she grew up there, her parents were both Japanese. Dressed in a sequinned skirt — sequins the size of iridescent CDs — and white blouse, her lower half resembled a silver goldfish while her top half evoked memories of wind blown ship sails embellished with more fish scales on her shoulders. The jolt of possessiveness which surged through you was unjustified, though the image of the twat sinking her well-polished claws into his sleeve was aggravating. “This could be just a rumour. Has he seen this already?”

“Mr. Kaiba has advised PR to stand by for the moment,” Miyu explained, “so there has to be some truth to it.” She also seemed less than pleased.

“This photo is from almost two weeks ago, why is it making headlines now?’

“Meagan’s agency just confirmed the rumour.”

“They did?” Sayuri’s voice cried, making you both jump with the shrill pitch appearing without warning behind you both.

“I think you should be more concerned about what time this is,” you said, peering down at your wrist watch. That it was a limited edition Burberry did not slip Miyu’s attention. She did not recall purchasing that.

“Eight forty-five...I’m sorry,” Sayuri said bowing. “I missed my train and...well, assistant secretaries don’t have company assigned drivers.”

“No but I’m sure an alarm clock doesn’t need to be assigned by the company,” you said. “Keep the side comments to when I’m a safe distance away...like in the archive room right behind you.”

...

Knocking, you entered his office later that morning. Kaiba was choosing to leisurely sit back and watch the media firestorm sparked in the wake of the entertainment agency’s announcement.

“I’ll call you back,” he said, replacing the receiver on the holder as he noticed you enter. His eyes traced eagerly your approaching form as you traversed the room to stand before his desk.

“Are you really not going to release a counter announcement?”

“I was beginning to wonder when you’d take issue with the situation,” Kaiba drawled, his amusement lost to you.

“I did call your office to confirm what Miyu told me. It’s just it’s turning into a field day for the media and...” you sighed, uncertain how to conclude the rant of a statement. Your fingers dug into the upholstered cushions of the chair backrest.

“Does it bother you?” he questioned leaning forward on his hands.

“It concerns you and your corporation, of course it bothers me.”

“On a personal level,” Kaiba reiterated. “Does it bother you as my lover?”

The corner of your mouth twitched, goosebumps prickled your skin at what he had called you. “Your personal relationships shouldn’t concern me. They’re beyond my level of...clearance...I assume.”

“So you’re here with what purpose?”

“To ask you what your orders are.”

“I’ve chosen to do nothing. Are you telling me how to run my company?”

“No, sir.”

“Then get back to work.”

You heard him, though still you lingered before him for an extra moment. He made no motion to add to his dismissal. You took your exit with a mumbled apology he refused to acknowledge.

Two can play at being impassive, he silently renewed his resolve; a smudge on his reputation was a small price to invest.

...

“You can leave for the day,” Kaiba announced with his hands slipped into the pockets of his slacks. He stood indifferently before your desk.

Your eyes flickered to the bottom corner of your computer screen. “It’s hardly past five.” The other secretaries had left to deliver documents to other departments.

“I’ll call your driver,” he said.

“I still have to read over all these proposals for next week.”

“I’ve read them already. Go.”

Standing hesitantly at the command which was punctuated by a harsh edge, you opened your drawer for your phone and makeup case. The case held over the opening of your bag, you paused, eyes focused on the open zipper. “Are you not coming today then?”

“I think you made it clear you didn’t need me there.”

“That’s not what I meant.” He grunted as if in dismissal. “...Are you going home tonight then?”

“I didn’t think you had a high enough clearance for the details of my personal life. I’ll see you after the weekend.”

As he turned on his heel, stalking back towards his office, it was the heavy feeling of seeing a shield cracking in front of you face as a sword drew nearer.

“Seto,” you dared to say, and the address suspended him mid step. You held your breath as he faced you. He waited expectantly, but no more words would come. Kaiba made no motion to acknowledge what you had called him, and after a few moments of your unwillingness to speak, he continued his march back to his office.

What had you even hoped to say? Were you going to see her? It was none of your business.

…

Saturday afternoon you sat on your bed cross-legged with your teeth nipping at your polished manicure. You had forgotten the definition of leisure. How were your expected to spend it? You were raised with strict expectations; your time ruled and scheduled to the minute, so that every moment of it could be optimally monetized later. You had escaped to a life spent chasing dimes and school assignments on second hand textbooks.

Your mind was obviously boiling beneath the surface with scalding anxiety, but you still had nothing to do with your time besides gnawing at your nails.

You had more money in your account now than you could hope to spend in a year, there was groceries in the fridge and a wardrobe on the verge of bursting at the seams with every spring/summer line to ever see Milan and Paris for the season.

 _The girl who slept with Kaiba_ ; beyond this definition, did you have an identity? Did you ever? What books did you like? What movies did you watch?

The only thing you had ever done for yourself was run away, and it was beginning to seem as if even that you had done a half-assed job of.  
  
You had missed it when you woke up to realize he hadn’t come the night before. And the thought of not seeing him again until next Monday was daunting, though you didn’t know why.

You liked the sex. You had always liked that, but you didn’t remember forming any lingering attachment to him as a human being.

He had not called, and it was bothering you. He wasn’t your boyfriend, you reminded yourself, he had no obligation.

The scandal was burning like wildfire through every portal site and magazine article.

Standing off the bed, you paced to the window; considered and reconsidered the choices you had made in the days leading up to this. Tearing your nails from between your teeth, you paced back to the bed, then to the window again...and back to the bed.

Halfway through watching Marie Antoinette you switched off the TV in the living room, and decided to get dressed.

Kaiba had hardly spared any thought to how you would dress outside of work. You assumed his reasoning was that simply, it wasn’t a part of your life he was involved in, and therefore not important. Perhaps he went so far as to assume that you ceased to exist in his absence.

You didn’t want to wear your old clothes.

Pulling on a pair of blue Rag and Bone jeans you had discovered, you paired it with an oversized dress shirt which was easily mistaken for his. You pondered a long time over the patent black loafers from Gucci before sliding them on. You had a love hate relationship with both the brand and the concept of the shoe.

Snatching an embellished Prada bag from the shelf, you slung it across your shoulder.

…

The weather was tolerable, though you would have preferred it much better had it been a few degrees colder, and the cloud cover heavier. Even through your sunglasses the sunlight glared.

Encountering a classmate on the side of the road, she appraised you doubtfully. “Did you win the lottery?” she asked. She almost hadn’t recognized you.

“It was a late birthday gift,” you said, “from a friend.” An expert would confirm your lying habit was pathological.

“The whole outfit? Your friend must be loaded,” she remarked, before turning to greet her boyfriend who caught up to her. She introduced the lanky boy, and he seemed less believing of your claim. You thought you had seen him in another faculty at school, though the name was unfamiliar.

The conversation passed, and so did they, and you realized how closely you treated your acquaintances like cardboard cut-outs erected around you to fill the space. She had been in your class for two terms, and you had still forgotten her name; needing to dance around it.

You followed the pavement aimlessly; in the far horizon a familiar building towered. You wouldn’t venture quite that far, you told yourself, though the incentive of seeing him again if he had come to work on a Saturday was tempting.

Two blocks away you whetted your resolve; you wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

Beyond your peripheral, you heard a car door close; then there was a hand on your shoulder.

“We have orders to escort you home Miss, against your will if we have to,” the man said. “We ask for your corporation.” The kiss of the steel barrel of a gun you felt through your shirt, pressed into your spine. “You don’t want to bring attention to yourself in front of all these people.”

A sudden trembling ruptured through your body; your face made all the motions to cry, but tears didn’t come. Another man apprehended your arms behind your back, guiding you with a rough hand into the backseat.

The two men stepped into the backseat on either side of you. The driver tore away from the sidewalk, and you observed a forth man sat in the passenger’s seat. At least your father held you in high esteem when it came to somethings.

Your brain refused to acknowledge what was happening, your phone had been stripped from you. No words were exchanged and the sky turned a deep mulberry over the highway leading to Tokyo.

At the end of an hour’s drive, at the turn of a driveway, a mansion shrouded in twilight came into view; its eggshell hued walls painted with purple shadows under the cover of late evening punctuated windows flickering amber.

You didn’t need to step inside to sense the emptiness. Your blood had run cold and your skin burned.

The heavy mahogany doors opened to the entrance hall; two lines of a score of servants bowed deeply, chanting a greeting in unison.

“You can let go of me now,” you said in a low voice. “The garden is swarming with guards, where am I going to go?” The two men stepped back, releasing you with acknowledging bows.

Your soles scraped against the checkered marble foyer opening to the twisting grand staircase carved of ivory stone; splitting in to directions to the second floor.

A maid offered to take your shoes. You didn’t respect the man enough to remove your shoes in his home.

“Is father in his study?” you instead asked. She nodded. “Drowning himself in whiskey again I assume?”

“I’m afraid so ma’am.”

…

You knocked twice before you were invited in by a raucous slur. He had not drunken himself to a stupor, only half way there and he could probably stomach half a bottle more before he did.

At the smell of cigars which wafted through the varnished Ebony doors, your heart stuttered, drawing in a sharp breath as your memory ambushed you with the sight of his burly arms with his shirt sleeves rolled up thrusting you to the ground. You closed your eyes, willing for the replay to stop short of the beer mug meeting your temple.

You pushed past the doors to the familiar sight of his study; oak desk splayed with contracts and a disarray of papers, an obsidian fountain pen holder with two pens suspended in it, the third in his hand, curling smoke rising from the cigar poised between the fingers of his other.

Turning to fit the lock as quietly as you could convince it into the holder, your hands had not left the handle before glass exploded inches from your temple; a shard carving a hairline of crimson under your eye. He had pitched a highball glass from across the room. You began to tremble.

“You dishonourable, pitiful, pathetic degenerate!” he bellowed. “Are you intent on dragging the family name through shit!?” He had risen form his chair; hands anchored against his desk, leaning forward.

You kept your gaze low as you treaded to stand before his desk, though at a distance.

“It should have been you I sent off — not your brothers. You! You who didn’t have the decency to come to the funeral. How is a thing like you my offspring?”

“Then why did you call me again?” you asked in a murmur. “I promise I’ll live like I never even existed for as long as I live. I promise,” you could not find a voice louder than a quavering whisper, “that I will not live as your daughter or this family’s daughter. It will be like mum never found me in that orphanage you left me in. Please just — ”

“So you can continue being a whore to the elder Kaiba?” he spat, voice shaded with disgust. Your eyes shot up to meet bloodshot marbles. “I know everything, did you think I wouldn’t?

“But if that’s the man you want,” he sighed then, “that’s fine. As much as you repulse me, you’re blood. I would rather Kageyama passed on to you than some director holding his greedy gut open to swallow my hard work whole.”

“I don’t want it.”

A monstrous roar ripped from his mouth, it assaulted every wall and hunched you forward. You couldn’t help closing your eyes. Just because you couldn’t see him, it didn’t mean he couldn’t see you, a small voice reminded, but old habits died hard.

You heard him pause to catch his breath.

“Should you be smoking in your condition?” you asked in a hush.

He dismissed you with a grunt. “It’s spread all over, one cigar won’t make a difference.” He collapsed into a fit of wheezing. You almost reached forward, but he gathered himself.

 

  
“Both of your brothers’ stocks, as well as my own will be transferred to you by the end of the month. I don’t have much time left. A few weeks at the most. Your mother’s have already been passed on to your name. With what you already have, you’ll hold a sixty two percent stake. You can’t outrun family. More importantly, you can’t outrun me.”

Tears brimmed and fell. “I told you I didn’t want any of it!” you found yourself raising your voice. “All I wanted was to outgrow the scars I have all over my body to remind me — one for each time I disappointed you!

“I like Seto...a lot. But I can’t bring myself to come to terms with it because I’m afraid he’ll turn out to be exactly like you!”

“You’re the sole heiress to one the most powerful conglomerates in Japan. If you want him,” your father screamed, “then have him, but become his wife, no matter what, not some whore he’ll forget in a month.”

“You would know a lot about whores. I’ll keep him in the only way I can,” you countered. “It’s the only way I know how.” Your words had lacked discretion, and the resulting transgression was grave. He would teach you this with a memento you wouldn’t soon forget.

Your scream rippled in shrill waves across the study. At first it was a dull throb, spreading in sparks of splintering electricity through your cheek bone, then the cool burn of blood seeped through. The impact had hurtled you to the floor. The scotch glass laid in fragments by your feet and over your lap.

“You ingrate,” he cursed, stomping around the desk. The sharp blow of his palm exploded in your ear before he crouched beside you; your palm digging into glass. “You have a month to sort out your affairs. By the end of the month, if you’re not his, get ready to be married to someone else. I have a suitor in mind, a director of my board.” Locking your wrist in a crushing grip, he forced your thumb against the red pad of ink, before lifting it to press it against the document of appointment. “I already marked it with your stamp,” he said, referring to your official seal, “but in case you refuse.

“Congratulations, chairwoman.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work outfit: https://pin.it/pbb5qkjckovwa3
> 
> Jeans and shirt: https://pin.it/3xjwkvhuz2ezrv
> 
> As always, let me know what you think :)


	12. The Other Woman

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! Just a quick note to thank everyone for the lovely comments, this fic would not be updated as frequently as I bring myself to if it weren’t for them!
> 
> On a side note, I am starting a fluff/ Drabble fic called “Redamancy,” just to get out some idea of how Seto and Reader from my other fic would be as parents. It’s not a direct continuation, just a side fic until that fic reaches a point of parenthood, but if any of you are interested, do give that a go. :)
> 
> Enjoy!

Late eleven you were drenched in front of your apartment. You had asked to be dropped off five blocks away, and the storm clouds had come.

The blood washing down your cheek stained your shirt collar; the bruise was rotting to a dark pink, so why was it the hairline cut on the other cheek which stung under the pelting raindrops?

It was obvious your state disconcerted some residents as you traversed the entrance hall. In the elevator, the young woman took two conspicuous steps away from you to press herself against the far wall. You wanted to tell her that the space in an elevator only stretched so far.

Turning to the wall on your side, you scowled in the mirror. The richest woman in the country and you couldn’t afford waterproof eyeliner. How ironic.

You stepped off on your floor. The rest of it was a psychedelic blur brought on by the Tylenol 3 the head butler had given you.

Your memory caught snippets of stumbling into your room; a warm chill sweeping under the skin of your back.

In your delirium you craved him.

You stood under a hot shower, but your shirt and jeans clung cold against your prickled skin. You couldn’t understand, the water had been warm. Your hair was a mess of freezing needles plastered to your face; wet snakes slithering your neck. You couldn’t place your discomfort. You just couldn’t get warm.

You punched in a number you had memorized. You lulled in and out of consciousness. It went to voicemail, but you were persistent. You dialled again; he picked up.

“I miss you,” you babbled.

He answered panting, “What?” Your words lacked coherence.

He was panting, so you asked, “Are you sleeping with her? Are you with her now?” To you in that moment, the connection made a great deal of sense, and that it was impertinent to ask, escaped you.

…

That you had not called him, inquiring after the distance he had wedged in between, insulted him greatly.  
To see the missed call flash across his screen, it would not have surprised him a few hours ago. At half past midnight, he had stopped waiting. By the second, he disconnected the call with Mokuba, who had been badgering on about how four hours exercising without professional guidance could lead to collapse.

Stepping off the elliptical, Kaiba answered. Your voice was small, incoherently so. “What?”

“Are you sleeping with her? Are you with her now?”

Tearing the towel away from where it was draped over a lifting bench, he groaned. “Is that what this is about?”

  
“I’m so cold,” you told him in a whimper.

“Where are you?”

He heard your soft breathing, but you refused to reply to him.

It wasn’t mindless compulsion which raced him to the driver’s seat of a convertible, though he couldn’t say with any confidence that he was in complete command of his response, as he tossed the towel damp with sweat across to the passenger seat, flooring the accelerator.

As he stood before the door of your apartment in his slate track suit bottoms and black shirt, he couldn’t recall the make of the car he had driven here.

…

You woke up to the bitter smell of coffee sludge. The glare of sunlight drowning the room filtered past a figure obscured by shadow; though he stood tall before the wall of windows, and his tensely carried shoulders disclosed his identity. You understood he was the culprit suffocating the room with the intense aroma of coffee grinds loosely soaked in water to form some unfortunate paste; an appropriate substitute for coffee he would likely call it or something superior to what the commoners drank.

The sharp illumination of the light was an assault on your squinting eyes.

“Mr. Kaiba?”

He turned, a mug in hand, and a particularly irascible scowl, stronger than that sludge he took in the morning, brewing on his face. “I see you forget yesterday’s conversations before noon the next day.”

Your expression unable to conjure any interpretation for those words was an adequate response. “You don’t remember what we talked about last night.” It was not a question. He sat on the edge of the bed beside you. You noticed the hair dryer set over your nightstand, it’s wire neatly wrapped around it.

“Now that you’re more lucid,” he said removing a wet towel you assumed had once been cold from your forehead, “perhaps you can tell me why your father thought it appropriate to send you home to me with those bruises on your face.”

At the panicked expression he sighed. “You told me your father did that. Last night. Do you really not remember anything at all?”

You shook your head. “What — what else did I — ” You winced as your facial muscles contorted to speak.

“It’s not important what else you told me until I know the answer to my question. I can — I will have him arrested, but you need to tell me where he is, and why you went to look for him.” Word by word his ire mounted.

“Could you please close the curtains?” you replied, unable to withstand the brilliance of the light.

Suppressing a grunt he stood, holding his eyes closed for a moment to restrain the simmering frustration. He drew on the curtains with a force you thought would tear the fabric clean off the rail. Then he returned, and assumed his previous seat by your side. He reiterated his previous question.

“You came,’’ was the only coherent thought you could convey.

He pinched the bridge of his nose, and took a deep swallow of his coffee. “Yes,” he said, voice a tetchy consistency. “I actually came. You can’t believe I came, we established that. What happened to your face?” He over enunciated those last five words.

“He broke a whiskey glass over my face.” It hurt to talk, in every sense. “...But Mr. Kaiba, just — just leave him alone. It’s not like it’s the first time. You’ve seen it all. He’s in really bad health. Just let it go.”

“Your left hand had to be sutured, your left cheek has a cut on it and the surgeon had to pick out glass dust from your right. Half your face is purple with clotted blood. Bad health doesn’t excuse abuse — this surpasses the realm of abuse! I can have him put behind bars for attempted murder!”

You winced at the fever pitch; he seemed to notice. He loosened his clenched jaw.

“He’ll be dead before the trial.”

“Why are you being difficult?”

“Did they stitch my face?”

“No, a woman shouldn’t have scars on her face.” He added as if an after thought, “At the very least.”

“Then it’s fine.”

“Since you don’t remember from last night,” he said, “you don’t need to come to work for the time being.”

“If you’d like, I’ll hand in my resignation.”

“If that’s what you’d like,” he said solemnly.

You nodded. “When would you like me to move out? It will take me time to find another place, especially like this.”

“I never said anything about moving out.”

You watched him without expression; you wanted to cry, but your pride would dictate otherwise, you wanted to scream, and maybe ask him if he would consider holding you, but you just stayed, watching him blankly.

“Stay here,” Kaiba said, standing and stalking with some intent which required acute concentration — you assumed from his gathered expression — around the bed.

“I need to go to the bathroom.” Were you asking him for permission?

He stopped mid-march, affording you his attention. “Do you need my help?”

  
“No — no,” you choked, and he continued on his way.

  
You walked with a limp to your right leg, you noticed. The old bastard’s kick to the back of your shin as you rose from the carpet of glass had done some damage. How inconvenient. The resulting motion of your folding knees planting against the waiting glass explained the plastered knees which peeked from under your nightgown.

You recoiled at your reflection in the mirror; it had taken you a lapsed moment to accept that you weren’t standing in the room with a stranger. Kaiba was right, your face was painted a grisly shade of maroon; spreading from your ear to your temple, and down to your cheek; darkening as if a gradient mosaic to indigo as it reached under your eye.

He wouldn’t want to touch you like this; it was your first thought. Your second; then how would you keep him?

Again you bit the tears which teetered on the edges of making themselves known.

Your left arm was bandaged from your palm to your elbow.

Turning open the obsidian topped faucet, your eye encountered Kaiba in the mirror, standing behind you in the doorway. “You’re not supposed to get that wet for a week,” he said.

You released the heavy breath you had been holding in. “I’ll manage.”

“I’m serious.”

“Can I please just have a minute alone? Please?” The end of that sentence saw a watery decline in conviction, though he would not falter at the threat of tears.

“So you can cry and become a sopping mess? You already did that last night. I don’t need you catching pneumonia from crying on the bathroom floor all morning.”

“Then why don’t you leave?” you found yourself asking, leaning over the sink; clinging on to the edge as if for dear life. “Then you won’t have to deal with hideous little me.”

“Are you done with your pity party for one?”

“Sorry.” It was a conditioned reaction.

He tasted his words for a moment. “...I’m not asking for you not to cry,” he then said solemnly. “I’m saying you’ve given enough power to the person that’s put you here by crying over it. Do something about it, or move on, but never allow them to even unknowingly, hold any power over your state of mind. That’s when you truly lose.

“You did a fine job washing yourself — or rather standing in the shower with all of your clothes on,” he added in a lightened tone, “then going straight to bed in those same wet clothes last night. So I think you’ve played enough with water. You need to eat something.”

“I answered your question,” you spoke in a voice which resembled a scratched record, “so now answer mine. What did I tell you last night?”

Kaiba seemed reluctant to answer. “That the bruises and cuts were your father’s doing. That you liked how I didn’t smell of imported cigars or malt whiskey.”

“Yes but the more I look at you, you are like him. You have affairs behind your partner’s back.”

“I’ve never cheated on you. Not since I met you,” Kaiba said with confidence.

“I am the affair!” you cried. “You can’t cheat on the affair!”

“What?”

“I’m not your partner,” you husked, swallowing thickly, still only meeting his eye in the mirror.

“Of course you are,” he countered. “What else are you?”

“The other woman.”

His grim laugh echoed through the bathroom. “Do I look like the kind of man who has enough time in his life for multiple women?”

“What is Meagan then?”

“Do I owe you an explanation on my relationship with her?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

Shutting off the faucet, you turned to face him. “What does that even mean?”

“It means you need to eat something. I won’t repeat myself,” Kaiba grunted, heading back to the bedroom.

…

“So then who is she?” you asked as he stowed away the plates in the washer. “Why haven’t you released a statement disputing the agency?”

“Isn’t it too early for you to start playing my wife?”

“Your — your wife?” Your father’s words found their way to the surface of your thoughts.

  
“I didn’t realize it bothered you enough for me to address it,” Kaiba remarked.

“Even if it didn’t, she’ll be a smudge on your reputation.” Though at the moment, you weren’t exactly a cut of clothe who had the right to make such a claim.

“What exactly is the kind of woman who wouldn’t...be a smudge on my reputation?” he questioned, standing across the counter from you.

“Not me.

“I’m sorry, I think I overstepped my boundaries again”

He wouldn’t interject with anything to the contrary as you slipped away from your stool, hobbling with all the grace of a three legged moose, towards the bedroom.

…

You woke up midday to uninterrupted typing. You didn’t think you could take much more of his silence, and it was baffling to you his continued presence. For a brief moment you had contemplated asking what had kept him by your side, though the consequences from an eerily identical previous dialogue reserved you to silence.

As you pulled yourself up against the headboard, a collection of thickly bound stacks of paper found themselves strewn over your lap. You offered the taciturn chairman a quizzical expression.

“I’m suing the agency for defamation,” Kaiba explained. “Is that enough for you?”

“You’re suing an entertainment agency to make your point?”

He would only nod.

“What point?”

“Someone that frivolous would never make the cut.”

“Then what am I doing in bed with you?”

“Whatever insecurities you have regarding yourself,” he said dismissively, his fingers falling over the keys in some unbroken rhythm, “is yours to work through.”

“Sorry, if I’m not your mistress,” you begged for clarity, “what exactly am I.”

“For you to be a mistress,” he replied with acute irritation, “I would need a wife.” He held up his left hand, motioning with his thumb for his ring finger. “Last time I checked, I don’t have one of those. Have your medicine and go back to bed instead of asking me ridiculous questions, so I can work.”

You pulled you knees to your chest. “Whatever insecurities I have?”

  
“Here we go,” he muttered under his breath. Still, he would not distract from his laptop.

“What insecurities do you see in me?”

“I wouldn’t know, would I?” he retorted with a sardonic smile. “Because they’re yours. I’ve bought you this penthouse, gave you a personal car and chauffeur to drive you around at any hour of the day or night, bought you every luxury a young woman your age could ever hope for, paid for your tuition, your textbooks, offered you a position someone with twice your experience wouldn’t qualify for — ”

“In other words,” you interrupted, “you’ve bought me.”

“I’ve asked for nothing in return,” Kaiba growled.

“I’ve slept with you more times than I know how to count.”

The laptop screen met the keyboard with a pointed snap. You had captivated his undivided attention. Somehow, you didn’t feel so lucky. “ _I slept with you_ ,” he said with drawn intonation to his words. “More than once. I would never sleep with a woman I didn’t think was good enough.”

“Good enough?” you asked defeated. You were met with his unwavering stare. What had you honestly expected?

He could not fathom your scruples; he had complimented you in stealing his attention.

You swallowed your lips. He stood from the bed and walked to your side. From your nightstand drawer he produced a bottle of pills. Spilling a few on to his palm, he offered you two, motioning with his head towards the tall glass of water on the nightstand.

“They’ll help you sleep,” he said.

A corner of your lip curled into your cheek. “Because I’m throwing a tantrum and I can be less of a nuisance to you while you work if I sleep?”

“No,” Kaiba rasped, eyebrows drawing together, “so when the power of the previous pain meds wear out, you won’t be writhing on the floor in excruciating pain. The physician I had examine you recommended them. I’m not trying to drug you.”

“You took me to a hospital?”

“No,” he muttered again with piqued irritation. “I had a medical team come here. You weren’t in a state to go anywhere when I got here, bleeding all over the sheets.”

“I’ve inconvenienced you,” you mumbled in a hushed whisper, swallowing the pills with a long gulp of water.

“You seem to have made a habit of that in our relationship.”

Suddenly you couldn’t understand the principles of exchange in your relationship anymore.

 

”Good enough,” you repeated morosely as you slipped into the sheets. What a euphemism for tolerable. 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you think!


	13. Expectations of a Relationship

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone, I hope all of you have been well! I’m sorry this story has been neglected as of late, I’ve been going through a lot of changes personally — and still am — so inevitably the updates for this story suffered. It was all the lovely comments which inspired me to take this up again, so please do let me know what you think!
> 
> Enjoy :)

He was like summer rain, you didn’t ever know when he would leave. So you had not expected him there; expected to wake up to his chest, his muscled arms slung over you. Still, it was a careful hold, as if you would vaporize if he pressed too hard.

The lace hem of your black silk nightie had ridden up your thigh under the sheets, but he held you in such a way that you could not reach it.

From the silence of the city outside, you imagined it was the last lingering hours of the night, reluctant to give way to morning.

As he slept, your mind began to fill the voids of his silence, supplying yourself the words he would not speak.

You said out loud the first response which manifested in your medicine addled mind to something he had not ever said though regardless, lingered a consequential fact in your relationship, “If you’re not ashamed of me, why haven’t you taken me home?” Why indeed, did he choose to keep you in this place, out of reach of the rest of his life, as if some bird hung on a high cage; though the implication remained that the door was always open, to leave.

“I imagined it would be more than a little strange to take a girl I’ve only met a handful of times while waiting my table at a restaurant to my bedroom,” he replied in a deep rasp, startling you.

You encountered bleary cerulean. “...And it was not weird to bring me here and buy me all of this?”

“In retrospect.”

“What do you,” you found yourself asking, “think of marriage?”

“Are you proposing to me?” he returned, sporting a conceited smirk.

“No...?”

“Then why does it matter?” His disposition grew sour.

“Why would I bother” you said, turning to the city, away from him, “when I know the answer?”

“You know so little of me, and yet you’ve formed all your conclusions. It’s a waste of my time to convince you against them.”

“Then maybe we should stop seeing each other.” The words had slipped, and you held your breath hoping he had not already tired of you entirely.

“Is that what you want?”

This was your chance. “No.”

“Then why bother suggesting it?”

“Because maybe you could find someone worth convincing, and worth sharing yourself with.”

His heavy sigh broke in a hot wave against your neck. “You’re acting like I’ve been an unfaithful husband to you.”

You allowed a dry laugh. “If you had been my husband, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

“Turn around.”

You winced at the command. “Why?”

“Because if I do it myself, I might rip off your arm as you are right now.”

You considered his words. “...No.”

“Fine. Then answer me this. What is your sudden obsession with marriage? You realize we’ve only been seeing each for a few days?”

Ouch.

“I asked you once.”

“That you remember.”

“I was just curious,” you defended.

“About?”

“About why a man like you isn’t married. You’re almost thirty.”

“Don’t discount me three years of my life,” Kaiba said. You hoped your silence would persuade him to elaborate. “Besides, women always have a motive.”

“And the situation you’ve put me in makes me any different from those women how?”

“I didn’t realize you were with me for my money.”

“The arrangement you’ve made for us, from this penthouse to my tuitions, the car and the driver and all of the _stuff_ hanging in my closet you bought me with your personal card, down to my fingernails...what exactly have you made me to be?”

He sighed your name. It was a tired sigh, one beyond the brink of frustration.

“No, what are we, Seto?”

“I imagine well acquainted if we’re on a first name basis,” he muttered.

He was too careful a combination of astute and cunning for you to ever strain an answer from him.

You tried to unravel yourself from him. “Where are you going?” he asked.

  
“To find food.”

“There’s takeout in the fridge,” he said.

“Thank you.”

…

The next day, Monday, passed slowly, and with the drowning of the sun over the Domino dockyards, you grew anxious, fearful even.

“Where are you?”  
  
Kaiba was likely confused by this ambush. “Where do you think?” came his response through the phone after a moment of considering your query.

“No,” you said, softening your tone, “I just meant, are you coming today?”

“I still have project proposals to read through.”

“After you’re done with work...are you coming here?” you pressed.

“What’s with you?”

“Nothing. Sorry. I just — I don’t — I — ”

“Yes,” he then replied abruptly, “I’m coming tonight.”

“I...won’t ask you when.”

“No.” He paused as if in thought. “I’ll have Isono bring you dinner.”

…

Late eleven and he marched with heavy steps through the front door.

“What are you doing sitting there?” Kaiba asked as he set down his briefcase, noticing you sitting on the step leading from the entrance hall. You had waited.

“I waited.”

His brows knitted as he took off his shoes. “You look like some sad puppy.”

“Do you like puppies?”

“What?”

You stood, walking towards the living room. “I’m more of a cat person myself.”

“Are you high on pain meds?”

“Probably.”

“Dinner?” he asked.

You hummed, yes, you’ve already eaten.

  
The conversation as he ate, well, there was none. He read some report as he mindlessly picked at his pasta.

“How was work?” you asked slowly.

“Fine.”

“Did you...have lunch?”

“No.”

“You didn’t eat breakfast either.”

For a while he was silent. “...I had coffee.”

“That’s not — ”

“You’re suffocating,” Kaiba snapped, glancing up from the paper in hand. “Even wives can be suffocating, and you right now are.”

“Sorry,” you winced. “I hope then you find a wife...a good wife, one who isn’t...suffocating...the way I am. It was a mistake hoping you’d come home. Sorry. Goodnight.”

As you left the kitchen, he called after you. You wouldn’t dare look back.

…

Tuesday you wouldn’t call, but early seven in the evening, you would hear the jingle of the front door unlocking. You had expected it to be Isono, though Kaiba’s monotonous drone calling for you alerted you to the contrary.

You scorned yourself when childish happiness was the first which surged through your thoughts. Still, you left your refuge on the sofa to meet him.

“For you,” he declared ambiguously, outstretched arm holding out a flat, blue velvet box. At a glance, it was obvious it was jewellery. You approached cautiously, though you wouldn’t accept his trinket. Perhaps it was more an olive branch, but you did not believe the man understood the notion of appeasing another party.

“What is it?”

At your hesitance he snapped open the dainty lock, before flipping open the top case and presenting it to you. In a word, it was magnificent; round and teardrop diamonds woven delicately as if to emulate foliage. It would be heavy, you had worn enough diamond necklaces before to know.

“I couldn’t.”

“Nonsense,” Kaiba growled, irritated that his efforts at reconciliation — as he had justified in his mind — was being rejected.

“I have no where to wear it,” you said.

“You will. If you’re going to insist on acting like my wife then look the part,” he snarled, plucking the string of diamonds from its satin bed.

He spun you to face away from him, draping the wreath of diamonds over your raised clavicle. It contrasted greatly his white button down you had burrowed for a dress. He had not commented on this.

“Seto...?”

“Hmm?”

“You know the more you do this, the harder it’s going to be for me to leave.”

“Where would you go?” he inquired with saddening nonchalance. “Back to your drunkard father? I don’t know why you would think I would allow that.”

In these moments it grew cloudier, the future he envisioned for the both of you, because even when you grew resolute he didn’t, he always deceived you with some hazy mirage, leading you on.

…

“You washed your hair,” Kaiba noted as you both ate dinner on the kitchen counter.

“The maid helped me seal my arm.”

He grunted in acknowledgement.

To ask him, many thoughts welled and welled; if he was sleeping with someone else, and if he wasn’t, if he wanted you. You wanted to apologize for looking the way you did, and you wanted to know why he wilfully came back each evening to see a face so grotesquely disfigured. And perhaps the most frightening, you wanted to know if he would ever want you again, because if he didn’t, what would he do with you?

“What is it?” he asked after many lengthy moments of studious observation.

“Nothing.”

More silence. “You want a meaningful relationship with me,” Kaiba finally said. It should not have inspired in you such an expression of shock, you knew, though you supposed given the stark nature of the confirmation, it could not be helped. “For that I need to know who you are. You’ve told me nothing.”

“I suppose that’s a mutual thing.”

“You’ve never asked,” Kaiba disputed.

“If I had asked, would you have told me?”

“Try me.”

No, this was a seasoned hunter’s trap. This man’s entire life was hinged on transactions of even exchange, and he would afford you nothing before you had sold him your life story. And even that for a morsel of his past.

“I have nothing to tell you. Anything of worth I’m sure you already know from your research of me.”

Indeed, he was much too prideful to admit his private investigators had turned up short. What he knew of you was that you were not dangerous, though even those results grew to be doubtful each day.

Still, your curiosity was parched. “How many were there, before me? Women, I mean.”

“More than I care to count,” Kaiba admitted. “None that I’ve brought home, or out of the office.”

A wry smile plagued your expression. “We’re all just means to an end then,” you murmured.

“No. Though understand, for me to consider a relationship with you, one of the caliber you’re asking for, I need more information than you’re affording me. I’m not a man in a position to choose a wife carelessly or on impulse.”

It was a dousing of cold water, though it was undeniably the truth. You of all women understood that, and for the briefest moments you entertained what it would be if revealed your status alongside his in society. Would he accept you with open arms or reject you on the basis of a longstanding rivalry? In either possibility, you did not want your future determined on the merits of a family you had long shunned. You didn’t want to be wanted for a last name.

“If I was an heiress, would that be enough?” You teetered on the edge; always a moth to his flame.

He laughed grimly. “Are you?”

“...No.”

“Then why does it matter?”

…

That night in bed you turned to face him. You were no better than a glorified sum of body parts loosely strung together so your attempt at perching your head on Kaiba’s shoulder, having hauled yourself across the bed to him, wasn’t the most graceful of movements.

Kaiba broke his pensive, static stare from the ceiling, peering over you as you positioned yourself against him without permission or warning.

“Am I bothering you?” you asked, slowly, cautious as if raising your voice would shatter some imaginary glass floor you both were standing on.

He grunted, no.

“Is something on your mind?”

“No, go to sleep.”

You couldn’t know with certainty if he expected you to heed his words as you instead pressed your lips up against the side of his neck. “Seto,” you experimented, testing your margin of error. Your hands sought the hem of his shirt; fingers wandering under to crawl up the grid of his torso.

“What are you doing?” he snapped, as your languid kisses grew longer and sloppier. You wouldn’t stop, and after his third time repeating the question, he apprehended you by your right wrist. “Stop!”

“You used to want me all the time.”

“What?”

“We haven’t slept together in almost a week,” you said.

“Have you lost your mind? Do you not see yourself?”

“Trust me, I try not to. I’m hideous.”

“No,” Kaiba replied, voice all but growling your name, “you have more bruises and cuts to you than actual bones in your body. What exactly have you made of me in that head of yours? I’m not depraved.”

“Is there someone else then?”

This time you heard your name barked, his pitch echoing off every surface it assaulted; the whole room trembled. “I have enough on my mind without you — ”

You curled into him, seeking refuge from the ire you had stirred in him, against his own chest. At the motion Kaiba abruptly restrained himself.

“What is it with you?” he asked in a contained tone.

“I missed you.”

He sighed, plucking your hand out from under his shirt. “There isn’t...someone else.”

“Goodnight.”

  
“ _Please_ don’t start crying,” he scolded, observing the climbing pitch of your words.

“I’m not crying,” you said in objection, though you gave him no reason to believe you.

“Goodnight.”

…

Wednesday morning, you woke up to an empty bed; Kaiba had gone to work, or so you assumed until you wandered into the kitchen to find him stationed at the head of the dining table in the next room. It was late morning, and for several moments, you stood perplexed, steps past the doorway, as if a GPS recalculating its coordinates as your disoriented mind tried desperately to understand how to confirm what you had seen.

Recalibrated, eventually you retraced your steps back, staring through the doorway until the sight across the room made sense. He did not disappear in spite of how long you watched him, only, the longer you observed him, paper seemed to manifest endlessly from one file on the edge of the table, throwing the table further and further into disarray.

He looked up to meet your silent presence. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“I’m seeing Seto Kaiba in my apartment in daylight. Same difference.”

“Funny.” Did his lips curl ever so slightly or were your eyes legitimately deceiving you?

“How come you’re not at work?” you asked, still standing in the doorway. He finally sat, threading slender fingers absently through his hair.

“You have a follow up appointment with my personal physician later. I need to hear the diagnosis.”

You laughed lightly. “I don’t need a check up, I’m fine.”

Perhaps as should have been expected, he was selectively deaf when it conveniences him. After a few more moments it grew obvious his ignorance of you was intentional, and submitting yourself to the idea, you removed yourself to rummaging the fridge and pantries in search of breakfast.

As you sat on the seat beside Kaiba at the table he scowled, his present object of scrutiny; your bowl of sweet chilli crisps.

“Isono is on the way with breakfast. Don’t eat that rubbish first thing in the morning,” he snarled. The offensive snack in question being allowed on the grocery list in itself had been a small victory of its own. When you had moved in — if such a conventional term could justify how you had come to cohabit this place — his instructions to the housemaid grocery shopping had been brief, though oddly specific; organic, fresh, possibly locally sourced, and no processed junk. The checklist had grown substantially under your request to her, the list extending a mile from gelato to chocolate truffles.

  
“You realize I’m not a child?” you nonchalantly returned, your incessant crunching of the potato crisps surely inspiring great irritation in Kaiba.

“On a behavioural standpoint, that’s doubtful, though having slept with you as many times as I have, I sure hope not,” he muttered, sorting through the papers tossed across the table in no discernible order.

Deciding it best not to voluntarily invite more insults, you reserved yourself to watching his fascinating, though nonsensical all the same, shuffling of papers. Your attention was only partially engaged as your languid gaze drifted from one to the next, your munching of what he had moments earlier forbid you from consuming, ceaseless.

You could not have been any less interested, not that the situation required your concern. This again would prove itself to be a premature assumption, as from under a document Kaiba rescued from his chaos of paperwork, the Kageyama corporation emblem revealed itself to you.

You couldn’t help but allow it to occupy the full span of your attention, the lack of context to its appearance before you, so conveniently after being appointed chairwoman feeding your paranoia that his bloodhounds was closing in on your bleeding trail.

“What’s...this?” you questioned feigning innocence, tentatively loosening the document from under the pile, hoping he wouldn’t intercept your efforts at gaging the situation before you had held the piece of paper the right way up.

“It’s a contract,” Kaiba said, the distraction evident in his voice. “I need new planes and choppers commissioned for Kaiba Corp. Our current ones are aging and many of them are left over units from when the company was a weapons manufacturer. As much as I despise working with a corporation with military affiliations, there isn’t a corporation to rival them in the industry.”

“I...hear you don’t have a very good rapport with their president,” you probed, the slow acceleration of your heart a low drum beneath your throat.

“No, that old geezer has always been a thorn in my side. Always the smooth-talking diplomat with politicians and investors, I doubt anyone knows the reality of him.”

“The reality?”

“A womanizing sleaze,” Kaiba said. “I’ve had the displeasure of walking more than once into a negotiation with him to have him throw a writhing heap of intoxicated escorts at me. Half those women looked to be younger than you.”

“He wouldn’t have been entertaining with minors,” you said, though the exact root of the impulse to come to his defence eluded you. “He just...wouldn’t have.”

“This is why I say people don’t know his reality, or they encourage it. Don’t buy the bullshit his PR team feeds the media.” It was certainly eye-opening to hear such a debasing testimony of your father.

“I...believe you,” you said meekly. It was a sincere declaration, not one strung together half-heartedly to win his affections; living, you had witnessed many dark back alleys in your father’s life, and many doors, you had not possessed the courage to open. They were unavoidable hazards which accompanied the profession, your mother had advised, insisting you avert your gaze, turning the other cheek. The podium of privilege you enjoyed in life, she had said, was inevitably, you reaping the harvests of his life’s work; without discriminating for the moral wholesomeness of how the results had been obtained.

“As you should.” You motioned to speak, all in hopes of steering the dialogue away from the unsavoury topic of conversation, when he continued. “That being said I hear the windbag has stepped down from his position as chairman. Hopefully his replacement isn’t a festering pile of filth. Though it wouldn’t be a surprise if they decide to stay on brand.”

“Right...the new chairman. News certainly travels fast.”

“You knew about this?” Suddenly you had earned his undivided attention. It was always unintentional.

“No!” It was a panicked reaction. You knew information was yet to be released through the media.

“Then what did you mean by — ”

“Nothing,” you said firmly, palpable alarm flushing your face. “Are you sitting in for a meeting with them? For your new planes?”

“Yes. A meeting has been arranged with the new chairperson and both boards of directors in attendance for the day after tomorrow.”

“The day — the day after to— tomorrow? This Friday. With the new chairperson?”

“Yes.”

…

You stayed up late the night before it would all go to hell.

You stood barefoot by the window, against the stars and the city, a loosely wrapped shawl fallen off one shoulder, baring it under the thin strap of your nightie.

“What are you doing not going to bed?” Kaiba asked from his side of the bed, taking off his glasses as his attention flickered for a moment to you from the chrome blue screen you had grown tired of sleeping under the light of.

“In a minute.”

You liked to think you pondered your words for a very long time before you spoke them to him.

“Do you think if we met as different people, we would still be here...together I mean?” you asked. You were still looking out the window. “Would things have been better or worse?”

Kaiba sighed. “Is this about marriage again?”

“Promise me you would still want me then.”

“What melodrama are you shooting over there by yourself? Get to sleep.”

“I don’t think I can.”

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you think :)
> 
> Necklace: https://pin.it/payjxa5jvyqnhs
> 
> Dining room: https://pin.it/h4mr55adyys4wv
> 
> Living room: https://pin.it/kkn3w4m27dcgb2


	14. Waiting For The Storm To Blow You Away

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! Thank you for all the amazing, amazing comments in the last chapter. I do reply to every single one of them but thank you so so much again. I kind of considered shelfing this fic in favour of the other 3 that I’m doing but seeing all the interest that this has convicned me to go on. They really do mean so much, so thank you. 
> 
> Also Est says all the duel monster references are accurate. And what I mean by that is, Est, thank you for taking the time to proofread the random snippets which out of context probably make no sense to you when I send them at odd hours of the day. Really, thank you. I know how you feel about this fic. 
> 
> Anyways, enjoy!

Thursday night.

“You said I had a month to sort out my affairs,” you demanded of the conniving old man.

After a long exhale of smoke away from the receiver, he spoke. “Technically,” he drawled, “you have the greater part of three weeks. It’s already been a week since you scampered like a whimpering dog with your tail between your legs back to Kaiba.”

“Father!” It wasn’t a title you used liberally, and the way it ripped from your throat, it had not denoted respect. The old fox had been a slippery catch; leading you to the brink of considering returning home to the estate for a moment of clarity.

“This is business, child, you ought to know better. Why are you acting like a pauper I picked up from the orphanage?”

“But you did pick me up from the orphanage!” you said, a certain bitterness gathering in your palate.

“No! I tried to get rid of you there, because you were weak! You always have been,” he snarled in response. “It was an embarrassment to admit we share the same blood.”

“You’re not even denying it now.”

“I have no reason to. I’ve already gained everything there is to be gained. And so long as I don’t gain a son-in-law from the Kaiba family, I can close my eyes without regret.”

“He was right about you,” you said.

“Yes, believe the man who’s making a whore out of you over the man who raised you, that’s very like you.”

“He’s been nothing but good to me,” you hissed in defiance.

“They have a name for that in psychology, my dear. Stockholm Syndrome.”

“And they have a name for the life you’ve been living; Mania.”

“That’s exactly the sort of unoriginal response I expected from someone like you,” the old man drawled. He paused to consider his next campaign of well assembled insults, because god forbid it be delivered with subpar prose, and that space you could think of nothing to fill with. There was a soreness of unfinished business lingering against the back of your throat, or perhaps a glutton for the battery he dealt your self respect, you wouldn’t cut the line. “You’re on your own tomorrow chairwoman,” he eventually said, the resentment palpable. “I’m in the Swiss Alps on a ski trip.”

“With several mistresses, I would imagine.”

“I assumed that went without saying but you’ve always been short a few thousand brain cells. The torch is yours now, try not to burn yourself alive. And as the man that had the misfortune of raising you, let me give you one last piece of advise. Life isn’t fair, remember that. Money is the only true religion and even that can’t replace my two boys with you. Believe me if it could, you would be gone in a heartbeat.”

“Since it can’t, why don’t you smoke an extra cigar a day? I’m sure it’ll bring you closer to them.”

Before the imminent retaliation you disconnected. You didn’t think you had the nerve to digest a word more of the twisted old man’s abuse. Deprecatory back and forth seemed to be a favourite pastime of his, and you simply did not have enough many layers of thick skin.

Slipping into the refuge of the sofa cushions you smothered the oncoming collapse consuming all your defences as it spilt to the surface, against a pillow. Still, the single, defiant sob disturbing the peace of the vast residence reverberated, and though no one would hear it, the wretchedness in its echo broke your own heart.

…

When Kaiba arrived later that evening, you were a perfectly assembled puzzle. He pondered quizzically the homemade spread of dishes on the kitchen counter, before looking to you for answers.

“You...cook?”

It occurred to you that this may be the last meal you share together. “Yes. I’m...not very good at Japanese food. I hope you don’t mind this.”

“What exactly is this?” Kaiba asked, loosening his tie, and shedding his suit jacket.

“Well,” you stammered, nervously adjusting your apron. “There’s egg fried noodles, lamb and mushroom risotto — I may have made that mushy...a little. And — well the mushroom sauté is garlic flavoured and uh...right, there’s the chicken salad and — ”

“You made every dish you know how to make, I get it,” he said, interrupting. “I was getting sick of take-out anyway.” He settled into one of the stools tucked into the island, draping his tie over his suit and loosening his top couple of buttons.

You stood with bated breath, having placed a plate in front of him, as he rejected your efforts to serve him.

“Are you not going to eat?” he asked, impassive in the way he studied you.

“After you tell me how it is.”

“It can’t be as awful as the restaurant you used to work at,” Kaiba muttered, diving his fork into the risotto.

“You know, it never made sense to me...I mean it still doesn’t make sense to me why you kept coming there when you hated the food so much,” you said, sitting across from him.

“Mokuba liked that place. It was close to the Tokyo highway exit.”

“But I’ve only seen your brother a handful of times. You came there on your own a bunch of times after that. It was no where near your company, or your mansion I don’t think.”

Kaiba pointedly set his fork down against the marble. “What answer are you hoping to get out of me? That I was so possessed by you that I came to see you?”

“Well — no,” you stuttered, the earlier emotions which were still tender welling to the surface. “I just — why would anyone come looking for me of all people?” With your forearm you wiped away the beading tears, the sudden vulnerable display bewildering him.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You know what I — I’m not the brightest bulb in the shed and I’m a few thousand brain cells short. I’m about as good as a Kuriboh, only useful for being sacrificed for other cards people actually want.”

It was not the intended reaction, and you watched perplexed as he erupted into a fit of laughter, or rather a maniacal chuckle. As he brought himself to calm from the paroxysm which stretched for a length of time which bordered concerning, he fixed you with a look of endearment. To you, such an expression was severely displaced on a man such as himself. “You don’t know anything about the game, do you?”

“No.”

“It’s cute that you try.”

Cu- _cute_? Did Kaiba know the definition of the word? Granted, it was spoken with a discernible tone of derision.

“Though I think you should know, if that’s the card you’re adamant on personifying, in my years on the pro-duelling circuit, I’ve seen that annoying fluff-ball do a ridiculous amount of damage.”

This was likely the most engaged he had been in a conversation with you, and the least tilted stage. He complimented your cooking, though agreeing that the risotto could stand to be less soup-y. It was blunt in its delivery and in every sense frank. You appreciated the quality, and you enjoyed this rare attention.

You couldn’t be sure when exactly during dinner your hand had reached past his plate for his own, or by what miracle Kaiba hadn’t recoiled. Though perhaps the true miracle should have been how he willingly reversed your hold. It was like the man, something short of a death grip, the notion of affection perhaps lost entirely to him.

Still, you wouldn’t complain.

The conversation never quite recovered from duel monsters, and the subject bled into him indulging you in a new research and development project he was spearheading for improved holographic projection on duel disks. The details eluded and downright confused you, and he likely knew this as he divulged in great detail the inner workings of his company you had no clearance for.

Desert was bread and butter pudding, nothing elaborate. You had had twenty minutes to throw something edible together for dessert that would pair well with ice cream, and setting aside forty-five minutes of time in the oven, bread pudding was all you could prep and have on the table in time.

You observed that for the better part, whether personal style or food, you shared overlapping interests, and on a silly-school girl level, you felt an odd sense of compatibility with him. And shyly — read: shamelessly — you wondered if he shared those sentiments.

“Where did you learn how to cook?” he asked, carving into the raising spotted pudding.

“School,” you vaguely explained. You weren’t allowed in the kitchen at home.

“I didn’t know they taught you how to cook in private school. Mokuba burns water.”

“I guess the program depends from school to school. I was part of our school’s hospitality committee so —” You bit your tongue, that was a convenient loose end to unravel you just handed him. You hoped he would associate nothing with the passing remark. “Did they — did they not have anything of the sort in your school?”

“I went to public school,” Kaiba grunted. “That place was lucky enough to have enough textbooks for all the nerds.”

“I’m surprised you did.”

“It was a matter of convenience. I was homeschooled most of my life.”

“Fancy. I don’t think my father would ever care that much about me.”

“Believe me,” Kaiba snarled, “it wasn’t done out of anything as nonsensical as sentimental caring.”

Uncertain of how to expand on the remark, you fell silent.

 

“What exactly is the function of a hospitality committee?” Kaiba asked. You wondered if this was genuine curiosity or a bloodhound on the hunt for a lingering scent to lead them on.

“It means I can sit with my legs tucked underneath all of my body weight for hours making tea in the spring time and dress people in elaborate kimonos in the autumn.”

He couldn’t seem to find any more curiosity to fuel his interrogation beyond this.

…

“Are you sleeping?”

You stirred from where you had curled against the corner of the sofa. Muting the t.v, you lifted your chin away from where it was planted against the plush armrest to afford him your attention. “Did you need something?”

“I’m going away on a business trip at the end of next week,” he said, seated beside you. “I was intending to leave at the beginning of the week, but I rather not have you sit with my associates for dinner looking like you do. The last I need is my partners thinking I abuse you.”

“They don’t know we’re involved.”

“They’ll arrive at their own conclusions the moment they see you. Regardless, pack your bags. If you can’t make a public appearance it can’t be helped. I rather you not wandering around while I’m gone.”

How thoughtful of the brute, you mused. Though the point in contention would be moot following the meeting tomorrow.

“Do you not care for where we’re going?”

“I’m sure given your tastes, it won’t be anywhere deplorable. But I’ll humour your question. Where are we going?”

A harsh line gathered between his brows at the slight. He was obviously not impressed by your tragic lack of intrigue. In your defence, you felt it would only be masochistic to delude yourself with an unattainable future’s promise of excitement.

“London. I understand you have an above basic understanding of the language.”

“I’m...proficient.”

“So you say,” Kaiba grunted.

As he motioned to leave, you dove your well-manicured claws into his oversized cardigan’s cuffs, jerking him backwards. His expression demanded answers and yours offered him an unconvincing pout.

“What?” he finally vocalized the ominous expression — harshly you might add.

“I waited all day for you to get home.”

He relaxed back into his seat. “What’s your point?”

You received this as an invitation, so you crawled over the couch cushions to curl up on his lap. He made a teasing comment of how he understood your inclination towards felines seeing as how you acted like one yourself, and it was sweet until he declared that he hated the over-groomed weasels.

Still, that he had not thrown you off his lap was a victory. And you’d celebrate it. You would celebrate it by burrowing yourself further into him.

If this was the last form of intimacy you would be spared with him, you would wear down the moment to its bare bones.

“What’s gotten into you?” Kaiba asked, a tinge of amusement colouring his tone. He held you, or perhaps there was no other comfortable orientation for his arms in how you occupied all of his personal space.

“You smell good...you always smell good.”

“Are you mocking my personal hygiene?”

“No,” you said, raising yourself to meet his eyes. He didn’t flinch as you carelessly shifted your body weight against him, and your next request, he obliged wordlessly; “Kiss me.”

That your face was a mosaic of the ugliest blacks and blues, as if a rotting iris blossom didn’t seem to repulse him. Instead he rested his forehead against yours, and with a fleeting flicker of his eyes running across your face, learned your expression before giving you his lips. A firm thumb and forefinger at your chin was an unrelenting reminder of who was in control.

“Seto,” you breathed, each letter spoken with drawn longing.

A careful palm steadying your back, he laid you delicately over the cushions. The kiss unbroken if not for your punctuating gasps for air, he indulged you with his warmth, the moments stretching endlessly. Or lost in him, so it had felt. And suddenly, as he drew further away, greed filled the spaces he had been in.

…

You stayed up late the night before it would all go to hell.

You stood barefoot by the window, against the stars and the city, waiting for the storm to blow you away.

…

The morning calm was more of an all consuming rhythm of pounding blood in your ears.

“You’re up early,” Kaiba noted stepping out of the shower. He possessed no sense of modesty, or in his own words, he disliked conventional formalities where they were tedious.

The fight to keep your eyes from straying down was a losing one, and a throwaway glance at your face was enough to tell.

“How perverse,” he said, appearing scandalized as he wrapped a towel over his lower half. And yet it was delivered with such nonchalance that it was obvious it was a playful tease. “You can open your eyes now.” A firm finger under your chin coerced your stubbornly twisted neck to turn to him. When you opened your eyes you found him studying the old bruises with eyes narrowed with intent.

“They’re healing,” Kaiba said, brushing a thumb against the violet blotches fading into your skin.

“Yes but they’ll probably scar.”

“If it does, I’ll take care of it,” he replied, stepping past you.

  
Dressed now in a plush dressing gown, you watched from your place on the counter as he made himself a mug of coffee. Dangling legs lightly swinging, you remarked how his coffee was more just crushed beans lightly dampened in a cup. He was pointedly defensive of his version, adamant that it embodied the most accurate sense of the definition; “ _No frills, bows, whipped cream and crap._ ”

You pondered if sugar could be considered crap and if water was optional in coffee. You were also stalling.

He made no protests as you followed him around, though he said you reminded him of an overly attached mutt; not that he had ever owned one. At least, you didn’t think.

“I prefer cats.”

“Fine then, an overly attached hair ball.”

  
As he dressed, you crawled back under the sheets, still mildly guarding his warmth.

“Are you planning to do this every morning from now on?” Kaiba asked, fixing a plain silver cufflink on to his shirt cuff, standing over the bed. His expectant tone drowned under the strangling tension governing your thoughts.

You pulled yourself languidly against the headboard.

“I don’t know,” you said, reaching for the loose tie draped under his collar. Obliging he leant into you, and your fingers curiously summoned an old memory, answering an early question of his. _Did you know how to tie a tie?_

“I guess I didn’t need to teach you after all,” he husked, pressing a quick kiss against your lips, your chin held between his fingers.

Was this the end of a chapter, you mused.

  
There was a tearing heaviness choking your words. As you stood with his briefcase in hand at the edge of the entrance hall, you edited over and over your thoughts until the perfect had assembled in your mind.

“Have a good day at work,” you said as he stood, having tied his dress shoes.

“You didn’t need to hold on to it,” Kaiba responded, relieving you of the silver case.

“I know.”

Kaiba motioned to turn away, before a second thought orbited back to him. He set his case down. Reaching into his suit jacket’s inner breast pocket, he retrieved his wallet. “It occurred to me that you might not like the clothes I bought for you.” At the edge of his long fingers he held out a black card polished to a smooth gloss. Across its sleek surface, _Seto Kaiba_ was embossed in platinum. “Buy whatever you need for the trip...and whatever else you want. Just don’t use it on something ridiculous like buying a private island or a gold plated jet.”

“What?”

“My brother has tried and believe me when I say I will find out.”

You shook your head, pushing the card away. “You’ve made me more than comfortable, I don’t need it. I’m fine with what I have.”

“If this is some attempt to impress me with your modest spending habits, don’t bother.”

“It’s fine, really.”

He wouldn’t hear of it.

…

In the end you found yourself passing the card between your fingers as you sat in the backseat of your company car. On its surface you would catch your own gaze, contemplative and distant.

“We weren’t followed?” you asked the young man beside you.

“No, president.”

Witching hazel eyes, glinting of shades of jade, dark hair you couldn’t decide if it had quite crossed the realm to black, and a fair complexion, the newly appointed vice-president wore his pure blood pedigree on his sleeves in both mannerism and presentation. He was tall, and whilst you could not speak with any exactness of his height, he would stand no shorter than a few inches from Kaiba. Still, it was undisputed in your mind who had worn the Zegna suit better; granted they were different shades of navy.

“How confident are you in securing Mr. Kaiba’s contract in this meeting?” you asked him.

“I have no doubt in my mind that we will secure it.”

“Give him anything he asks for,” you instructed, playing with the aforementioned president’s card.

The morning light glittering off the name the card boasted did not escape the vice-president’s gaze.

“What?”

“I said give him anything he wants. He’s an important client and negotiation will piss him off,” you advised, reflecting on the conversation which had left you with his card. “...In the end the man always gets what he wants.”

“Like you?”

“Do you think less of me because of my relationship with him?” you questioned, affording for the first time your undistracted attention.

“Hardly.”

“It’s fine. I would imagine it’s difficult not to. Your only source is my father’s opinion.”

“He told me in your best interest,” the young man replied.

“Yes...all you big, successful men always have the helpless little girl’s best interests in mind,” you said, gathering the left sleeve of your power-blue blazer dress to allow him a glimpse of the bandage spanning your whole arm.

He met your disingenuous smile cautiously, unblemished hands reaching for the arm you offered him. Slender fingers wrapped your forearm, always careful never to be felt.

  
“You don’t need my pity,” he said, “but I am sorry. I would never — ”

“You’re right, I don’t.”

…

The welcoming committee was numbered and contained. The most senior executives huddled in a small congregation outside the doors of the underground parkade to greet you as you exited your vehicle. They fell into an orderly bow as if wound clockwork, a quiet wave of the susurrus of their suits overwhelmed by their collective greetings.

A grim expression to you, you stood awkwardly before their reception. What would you say as you stood at the helm of a ship you did not want to steer, the burden of their livelihoods thrust upon your shoulders?

Cold fingers slid between the spaces of your own you held fallen by your side. It was unexpected, obviously, but the first you remarked was the coldness of his grasp. Seto was always warm to the touch.

You recoiled. “Have you lost your mind?” It was less a question; a warning ripped out in a hiss.

“I didn’t think you were averse to physical contact,” was the striking vice-president’s audacious response.

“Well I beg your pardon.” You maintained your voice to a whisper. “You think I’m easy because of what you’ve heard from my father?”

“No,” he said stepping closer to you, breath breaking against your hairline. “I assure you I hold you in the highest regard, but I do think I have every right to hold my fiancée’s hand.”

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Blue blazer outfit: https://pin.it/5xxmpk4k2oh3f4
> 
> Let me know what you think :)


	15. Fiancé

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! Thanks for all the lovely comments, again! 
> 
> Enjoy!

 

 

“Fiancé?”

 

The word just hung there. The expectation just hung there. Your face boiled as you hunted for composure in that suffocating place.

 

“It’s a pleasure to finally make your acquaintance,” you heard a voice suspiciously similar to your own say. “Let’s all do our best to get along.”

 

They agreed; why wouldn’t they?

 

Then a man with a certain familiarity sought your attention, stepping forward from the crowd. His greying tresses smartly swept back was straddling an undecided line between russet and ebony. His eyes were dark, but his defined facial features lacked novelty, as if you had seen it all before.

 

“Please,” he said shaking your hand,“the pleasure is ours. It is an incredible honour have such an accomplished young woman join our family. Would you have some time this evening? Your mother-in-law is very much looking forward to cooking you a traditional dinner. ”

 

“Father,” your self-appointed fiancé rebuked his forwardness.

 

It was neither a choice, nor were you accomplished, you wanted to remark. And no, you would rather share take-out on the sofa with Kaiba.

 

In spite of his son’s reproach, the man was persistent, expecting a response to his ambush of an invitation.

 

“No,” you found your voice. “No, I’m afraid I have previous engagements. Perhaps...some other time.”

 

“Yes, yes of course,” he said, “perhaps some other time.”

 

…

 

“You were only a little girl when I last saw you,” the pompous vice-president spoke as you traced the grand oak desk placed against the glass wall furthest from the door with your fingers, walking its perimeter.

 

You had hardly a handful of memories in this office, and its bare bones still contrasted greatly your recollection. It had been well ventilated, the otherwise lingering smoke of the old man’s cigars no longer tenaciously clinging on to every surface. An ominous smog had lifted.

 

“Then I went away to Harvard, and I did a semester away in Cambridge, which was obviously a better fit, so I completed my Masters there. And even after all these years, you still look very much the same.”

 

“Cambridge, that’s very impressive,” you said, sinking into the newly replaced leather chair. “Did you know Seto has an honorary doctorate from Harvard?”

 

“I don’t think there’s anyone in Japan that doesn’t know,” he replied. “Though it was hardly earned, don’t you think?”

 

“On the contrary for his contributions to the advancement of the fields of technology and physics, I think it was well deserved. He’s much too brilliant to slave his youth away at some second rate university with third rate programs.”

 

“Have I offended you in some way?” he asked.

 

“What on earth would give you that impression?”

 

“I’ve been meaning to say, I must warn you of something.”

 

“Warn me?”

 

“I’ve spent the greater part of my adolescence, up until now, abroad. I can bring myself to be understanding of the relationship you’ve shared. But Japan’s a very different place. Your indiscretion may cause people to talk about you.”

 

“Talk about me?” You scoffed. “Isn’t that an expectation of people like us?”

“You know well what I mean,” he pressed. He traversed the office to stand before your desk. “Is there anything I may do to persuade you from your inclination for Mr. Kaiba?”

 

You let out a disheartened laugh. “You know I wish there was.”

 

“I could give you everything.”

 

“I don’t want everything,” you replied, turning to face the city. “I want him. And you’re not him.”

 

They shared a bizarre likeness to each other in overlapping idiosyncrasies. You noticed he never smiled, and they both stood with a certain tense erectness to their form. Calculations were always computing behind cold eyes, but in Seto’s you had invaded his space just enough to feel a vague radiance of warmth.

 

If it was a figment of your imagination, that admittance into his territory, what a cruel joke it would be. And you would only have yourself to blame.

 

“I could be better.” With a hand gripping the backrest, he spun you halfway to face him.

 

“Get ready for the meeting. Make sure no one mentions anything about me. If so much as a hum slips into his ear, don’t think I will not retaliate with apersonal vengeance.”

 

He was as apprehensive of you as you were of him. You were an enigma; your father’s daughter, and what’s more, you had endured him. And you wore the battle scars on your face. They embellished in some grotesque display your whole body. He knew a survivor was never to be admired, they were to be feared. For in a battleground where no else had, one needed to ask themselves what the survivor had done to outlive alone, all else. 

 

You discussed so openly your weaknesses and you had turned away many times from privilege and affluence. It was stark, and incomprehensible to him. It bordered on being an offence or perhaps the absence of sanity.

 

And your weakness, it was not something the well-bred gentleman could overcome. There was no method by which a loose canon could be overcome. There was no method to Kaiba’s madness.

 

The young man pulled away. Hands sleekly slipped into the pockets of his slacks.

 

“You know,” he said, turning to you as he reached the door. “He’s been poking around your student records. It’s been difficult keeping the yearbooks from him. From what I hear, you were such a poster girl for that school. So even if you don’t show your face or threaten every single board member to keep a tight lip — oh wait, yours wasn’t a threat, the lie that you couldn’t present yourself in the state that you were in — Kaiba will find out.”

 

“Is yours a threat?”

 

His warm tone could not deceive you. “Is that what it sounded like?”

 

…

 

“Sato Eiichi,” Kaiba snarled, shaking the man’s expectantly outstretched hand. “I would say I was pleased to make your acquaintance, but I didn’t sit in traffic for twenty minutes to make small talk with second best.”

 

“My sincerest apologies,” the unfazed vice-president returned in an even voice, “but our president has been hospitalized, having met with an accident earlier in the week.”

 

“If you would afford me the name of the hospital, I’d be more than happy to pay my respects,” Kaiba said, his disparaging tone unrelenting.

 

“I’m sure they would appreciate the sentiment but I assure you it’s not necessary.”

 

Kaiba narrowed his eyes, brows gathering as if storm clouds over cerulean eyes. “Is that so?”

 

The vast boardroom stretching behind the two gentleman held its breath, eyes honed on every mannerism of the young president. He conveyed with every gesture that the meeting would end before it ever began, but then in an unexpected turn of events, he assumed his seat overlooking the long table circling the room.

 

…

 

“Who made the cut?” Kaiba asked Eiichi on the long elevator ride down. “Having been acquainted with your former chairman, I’m curious of the selection process.”

 

They stood shoulder to shoulder, hands concealed in trouser pockets. Under the bright lights of the elevator, reflecting between the walls of mirrors, the two tailored suits were hardly discernible from each other.

 

“The new president wishes to introduce themselves to you formally on their own terms,” Eiichi responded. “I hope you would understand.”

 

“I understand the intended successors were met with a tragic accident. Naturally, would it not be his youngest daughter who would be in line to the position? Given she is his only surviving heir.”

 

“You certainly possess a great deal of curiosity of the chairman’s family.” Eiichi was doggedly elusive.

 

“I believe I’m acquainted with her,” Kaiba said, possessing little conviction of his words. “His youngest daughter.”

 

“You are?” The jolt of surprise which sharply accented his words was difficult to smother.

 

“Is there any reason I should...not be acquainted with her?”

 

“My fiancée is...someone who keeps mostly to herself,” Eiichi found himself saying with reckless abandon, his competitive spirit crossing him.

 

“Fiancée?” Kaiba could not restrain himself from the growl which ripped.

 

“I trust that you would keep that information to yourself. As I’m sure you can imagine, it was certainly a surprise to hear my fiancée was an acquaintance of yours. She’s never mentioned you.”

 

Kaiba reserved himself to receive the announcement the second time with a grunt. It was wholly possible you were an entirely different woman. Oh but how unlikely, his better judgement provoked him. Somehow, he could not bring himself to ask for your name.

 

…

 

The housemaid was polishing the grand piano. It stood side by side with the city, all of Domino its audience.

 

The glass wall stretching across the room showed you a silent city. Or perhaps this high up, you were deaf to its toils. You were undecided on its silence, but its pulse undeniably beat. Shiny little cars you could cover with the pad of your smallest finger wove and lined up between toy like structures, all lit up with steady dots of sparkling ivory. In between scarlet flecks glimmered, and every once in a while, if you observed with enough diligence, you could catch one of those ivory dots disappear, blending to darkness; another person’s story which had beyond the well-lit window felt so palpable, bleeding to obscurity.

 

As the matronly woman moved to close the lid of the piano you stopped her. You had not played in years; in fact you could not read musical notes, but there was one piece you had memorized as a child. You had remembered how to tie a necktie, so perhaps, your fingers had also retained this whimsical melody.

 

Für Elise. Yours was a simplified version. Ironically, you had always hated the melody. You had owned a wind-up doll who spun to the song, and the memory of the tune echoing to fill vacant halls, sweeping down empty corridors, trying to find someone to hear her sing had always been haunting. An old governess had loved winding the green eyed doll, allowing the notes to flood the lonely mansion.

 

Yet tonight it was perfect. Perfect to court the melancholy and remind you of how your past would not relent until it had claimed you back into its clutches.

 

Somehow your fingers would always slip. After the first few chords, the melodies did not match, the sound produced itself too sharp or too flat...too unlike the nostalgic composition.

 

Then a pair of arms lowered itself on either side of you, and slender fingers intertwining with yours, in lithe movements they played the tune your memory hummed.

 

You could feel his warmth breath on your ear. “I’ve always hated Für Elise,” Kaiba said. “A miserable piece.”

 

You shook awake at those words, as if you had been in a trance all these hours. “Seto.”

 

He hummed, as if to confirm to you his presence. 

 

“I didn’t think you knew how to play,” you said, feeling his lips wander the curve of your ear.

 

Another hum.

 

“Play me something else.”

 

“A good wife would ask me if I’ve eaten dinner,” he responded.

 

“That’s a cruel joke,” you said.

 

“If I play you something, will you tell me something about yourself?” He pressed himself closer, breathing in your scent. You were growing to be familiar, and he was desperate to know even a throwaway fragment of your reality. Once he had been greedy to know all of you. Now he craved confirmation. Some clue that you would be compatible in his.

 

“What would you want to hear about?” you murmured, turning to find his lips. They met and for a transient moment of bliss, he kissed you.

 

His lips never quite leaving he spoke, “You were old enough to remember the orphanage. You were at least three. Tell me what you remember.”

 

His air rushing in through your parted lips was intoxicating, and you grew heady. “...You don’t know that was me.”

 

“That scar on your back. You tried to sit and some kid pulled the chair back.”

 

“You’re wrong. I’ve had it as long as I remember,” you disputed.

 

“No, I know I’m right,” Kaiba challenged.

 

“Stop.”

 

“You cried because the disinfectant stung. You sucked on my finger until you fell asleep. It became a habit.”

 

You winced at his claim. “I didn’t.” You shook your head.

 

A slow curl to his lip offered you a glimpse at a shadow of a smile. “You did.”

 

“I...don’t remember you.”

 

“And one day you were gone. Who took you from me?”

 

“I don’t remember,” you whispered. It was a lie. “I’m sorry I don’t remember!”

 

Wordlessly his fingers realigned themselves over the polished keys. They began, note by note, building a melody you recognized. It was Chopin. More precisely, Nocturne No. 2 in E-flat major, Op. 9 No. 2.

 

You didn’t understand how a man could devastate you so throughly while at once being the medicine to heal the same soul. Possessed by the soothing melody, you shook gently against him, soft convulsions and muted sobs forced out under its compulsion.

 

Still, he wouldn’t stop, as if he knew you needed him to continue. He wouldn’t ask, maybe he prodded open a scab he had mistaken for a scar or thicker skin.

 

It would eventually lull you, and a tranquil state of hypnotism numbed your nerves.

 

“Dinner,” you asked him. He was sitting beside you, hands gliding across the keys, even the arm holding you together. “Have you eaten?”

 

“No.”

 

“It’s almost midnight.”

 

“Did you not wait for me?”

 

“I did.”

 

…

 

You were nestled against the crook of his neck.

 

“How — how was the meeting?” You treaded on fractured ice, thin and melting. You wondered if through the broken surface he saw you. What had the bloodhounds brought him that you had kept lurking under the thawing ice?

 

“The new chairperson was hospitalized. The old geezer likely appointed another old quack he played golf with. It was obviously an intentional slight, sending me their second best. If they think such a grave insult would be overlooked by me, they’re bigger morons than I thought.”

 

“I don’t think they would be stupid enough to offend you,” you defended. It was difficult to find a believable rhythm to breathe. This was the most dangerous game.

 

Eyes against the ceiling, for several long moments he would say nothing. In these seconds of respite, you reached for the buttons of his shirt. Those severe eyes fell immediately from their thousand yard glare to pour over you. “I want you tonight,” you said softly, finishing the buttons. “I don’t think I can wait anymore.”

 

He allowed it, asking only if you could take responsibility for him.

 

“Yes,” you responded. And as he moved to clamber over you on all fours, helping you out of your nightie, “Make love to me, Seto, like a husband would?” you slid the careless whisper into his ear.

 

For a moment he was nonplussed, a frisson assaulting his composure. It manifested as a long shudder ravaging his body. It had been the most submissive request. He had never fathomed something so tender could be so arousing. The thought alone, the mental picture, was so inexplicably titillating. He was transfixed. What were you doing to him?

 

“Your misconceptions of what it means to have a husband concerns me,” he whispered in your ear. “A marriage doesn’t change a man. A husband has no obligation to love his wife.”

 

“What an awful thing to say.”

 

“You think a husband would make better love to you, care for you — ”

 

“I just want to be wanted!” you screamed, unable to help yourself. “For once in my life, I don’t want to be thrown away like I’m garbage. A husband would keep me. And I would belong somewhere, at least in the eyes of society. I could dispose of myself without love if it means I have a place to go back to...if I’m more than barely tolerated...

 

“What would you know about being wanted? No one in their right minds would reject you.”

 

You motioned to sit up, get away, get as far away as you could from him before the tears stripped you of what little dignity you had salvaged from that raw confession. By your shoulders he apprehended you, slamming you back against the pillow. 

 

“If you so badly want me to make a wife out of you, for the love of my sanity tell me something about yourself! To be wanted, a person needs to state their value!”

 

“I’m sorry.”

 

“That’s not an answer,” he growled, as you reached for the drawstring of his pyjama pants.

 

“I’m sorry just — let’s just finish what we started,” you pleaded, locking your arms around his neck.

 

“Maybe some other night,” he said. It was foolish to think you could surpass him in strength. Your fingers were undone with the slightest persuasion of his own.

 

You stifled a cry, and from where he had fallen beside you he filled the room with a laborious sigh. “I’m not leaving, stop acting so dramatic.”

 

The quietened cries didn’t fool him however, and after a few lapsed minutes he drew closer to you. “Would you like to suck my thumb?” he questioned, pulling your exposed back flush against his bare chest. You understood the playfulness in his tone, but couldn’t separate yourself from the devouring despondency.

 

“How dirty,” you condemned.

 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he swore.

 

“Liar.”

 

“...Only if you want it to be.”

 

Turning in his embrace, you urged yourself to find a semblance of peace against your world quite rapidly collapsing in on itself.One day soon he would find out about you, and you couldn’t bear to think about what he would do.

 

…

 

Coffee and hushed conversation; heavy winds were lashing the curving wall of glass with a vengeance. The sun was only now beginning to dye the backs of your closed lids a rosy amber. Still you were reluctant to leave the comfortable warmth fading all other sensations to naught.

 

“If you’re up, get ready,” you heard his voice penetrate your hazy thoughts dimming back to the clutches of sleep. It was unnatural how he knew you were awake. Had you even stirred? You yourself were still deciding if you were awake.

 

“It’s a Saturday,” you griped. “Let me be.”

 

“Have you done anything of particular importance this week besides passing out on the couch at odd hours of the day like a cat?”

 

“You’re mean,” you whined, eyes persistently closed.

 

“I’ll call you back,” you heard him say. Then just as it had strayed, his attention was back on you. “That should hardly come as a surprise.”

 

“Why do I need to be up?”

 

“We have somewhere to be.”

 

“We?”

 

…

 

This as it turns out was not the smartest course of conversation. You should have opted to staunchly remain asleep, even at the risk of leaving your future self at the mercy of a worse ire.

 

Instead you had sought to entertain his bid, and you found yourself stranded at a bespoke tailoring establishment. British inspired, the shop was reminiscent of the Huntsman on Savile Row — you would even dare call it identical; dark, stately halls boasting old portraits of notable clients, hardwood floors buffed to a soft gloss over the many years of being walked on, dim chandelier light and tall, foldable antique mirrors. It even employed gentleman who seemed to belong to a bygone era.

 

Seto Kaiba, given his occupation and inclination for new things and things that go fast, seemed exceedingly displaced in such a place which was reluctant to part with the glory of the early twentieth century.

 

If you had observed anything beyond the interior decor of the room, it was that Kaiba had exceptionally broad shoulders. Of course it complimented well his wiry physique and the overwhelming sight of him renewed a school-girl giddiness.

 

Beyond this, you were dangerously bored, it was difficult to appreciate how the suit accentuated those shoulders, tapered perfectly into his waist and flared exactly as it should at the back.

 

The older gentleman did not inquire after your relations to Kaiba, and Kaiba did not care to indulge. It went without saying that Kaiba was never in a sharing mood.

 

Standing before the floor length mirrors affording every angle, they both looked as serious as a heart attack. Words were hardly exchanged; it would appear Kaiba had installed a mind reading microchip in the tailor’s brain. From the vague conversation which did transpire, you understood Kaiba had been displeased with how the suit jacket had moved at the last fitting, and the cutter was left scrambling to tweak the garment to better compliment his posture. 

 

“What do you think?” Kaiba eventually turned for your opinion.

 

“I think you look very good,” you told him.

 

“Come here,” he said, “and take a better look.”

 

Standing from where you had been sitting unconsciously on your hands, you approached him with certain caution. He was always very imposing, even in a dressing robe, but this was a very different man who stood before you. There was a devastating demand for respect suffocating the room. The tailor felt it. You knew even the walls which had seen many generations of clients did also.

 

That you had witnessed this man in a disarming state of undress seemed a distant fantasy, a delusion of your imagination.

 

Your hands reached as if compelled by stunning blue eyes to his lapels, black and crisply tailored. It fit perfectly his chest, and this silhouette your fingertips reverently followed down, eyes stolen by the sight.

 

He waited patiently to meet them again, your eyes, head tilted the slightest degree in anticipation.

 

You couldn’t understand the significance of your opinion. You stood before him in your blush ballet flats and easy indigo dress speckled with white stars; the hem reaching past your knees and neckline diving between your breasts, reaching just above the cinched empire waistline. It almost seemed ridiculous.

 

“I think it fits you well.” As your eyes finally trailed up in search of deep blue, he hooked a tight arm around your waist, pulling you in. Without explanation, you found your lips pinned by his.

 

The tailor stood to the side; you were mortified.

 

Parting from you, “Have this ready by Thursday,” Kaiba said to the gentleman fighting to feign an expression of impassivity.

 

Arms clasped before him, he bowed.

 

You still could fathom no reasonable explanation for why he had needed to display such intimacy in this exact moment. What was there to be gained? Not that you were naive to the social hub that was a tailor shop, but what was the consequence of being connected to some faceless girl you were temporarily entertaining with in all the gossips and rumours of Domino’s high society?

 

…

 

“Why did you do that earlier?” you demanded as you descended the white marble steps of the shop, his hand firmly in yours. Were the loudly flapping flags secured by braided silver rope to the shop’s wrought iron balconies on the second floor drowning your words or did he simply possess no inclination to answer?

 

You were being dragged at his leisurely pace and it couldn’t be helped you knew; addressing it would do nothing — perhaps earn you a disparaging remark on your choice of flat footwear — the man was as stubborn as a rock. In fact, one would have better luck squeezing empathy out of a rock.

 

Always the showman, perhaps it was intentionally done to draw attention to how his duster coat billowed behind him. 

 

Your first question unanswered, you tried again. “Where are we going? You parked the other way!”

 

“The weather’s agreeable and it’s only a short walk,” Kaiba replied.

 

You knew with enough certainty to stake your own life that this man did not simply walk anywhere. Given the choice, he would fly a helicopter from one block to the next, though only because he had not invented teleporting quite yet.

 

There was also the matter of his reputation. It was a sunny Saturday morning and in spite of the winds adamant in sweeping you away with the utmost drama, you could count the seconds on one hand the time before he was recognized and mobbed.

 

“Short walk where exactly?”

 

“If you waited instead of goading me for answers, you would see, wouldn’t you?”

 

“People are going to see,” you hissed. “And I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to be plastered on the front page of every newspaper and tabloid for being the girl on your arm!”

 

He came to an abrupt halt. “Why? Do you have a reputation to guard?”

 

It was nothing short of ambush, and while you could not know with certainty if it had been an intentional one, the question stunned you to silence all the same. “...No — no,” you said recovering, “but you do.”

 

“Are you undermining my competency?”

 

“No I just — you’re not actually holding my hand you’re just dragging me like some rag doll. If you were in such a rush not to be seen, I think the car would be a better choice.”

 

“Don’t make a scene,” he chastised. “If you wanted me to walk slower, you should have said it.”

 

Nonplussed, you risked stumbling over your own feet as he slowed to match your pace, his agenda as guarded as his eyes behind those dark sunglasses.

 

In some ways the busy street played in disguising you amongst the obscurity of the number of other couples strolling the sidewalks. Given the district, yours and his attire helped in your ambiguity. The affluent avenue lined with luxury cars, an ensemble any less than a few thousand dollars was the exception, not the norm.

 

Still, you knew he wasn’t blind to the suspiciously exchanged glances and occasionally snapped photos; phones always surreptitiously held. You assumed it was your presence beside him that wavered their confidence of his identity.

 

He led you up the steps of a boutique, white washed walls and marble steps as the rest of the neighbourhood, the white awning inscribed in black capitols with the brand name was evocative of the bright scarlet one which had extended from the tailor shop.

 

“You will need a dress for the trip,” he said, holding open the door. Inside, he terrorized the shop assistant with his finest menacing glare. She quivered, and ran to find who you could only assume was her superior, possibly the owner.

 

“What I ordered,” Kaiba barked at the polished woman in a skirt suit.

 

“Of course, it arrived this morning,” she said, nodding. With a dismissive wave of her hand, she gestured for one of the assistants to go fetch whatever Kaiba was expecting.

 

A Maison Valentino dress was brought out, the black gown constructed entirely of a series of appliquéd teardrops cut from a silky organza, cascading in waves, gradually increasing in size. The corset of the bodice wasmasterfully concealed under many bands of these appliquéd layers, and as you slipped into the gown, you made the discovery of secret pockets.

 

He appraised you silently as the curtain was pulled back from the dressing room. Your carelessly falling hair held back by a clip better resembling one of the clamps fitting your dress, it all looked very unfinished. Still, he seemed to possess no mind to look away.

 

“How long will the alterations take?” he asked of the seamstress.

 

“I think a better question would be when you need it by, Mr. Kaiba.”

 

_Smart woman._

 

Thursday. He needed it by Thursday at the latest, and he would have Isono collect it on your behalf.

 

Making the payment, he once again led you by the hand out on to the street.

 

“I noticed you didn’t buy anything for yourself yesterday,” he remarked, walking beside you.

 

“No, I told you I have everything I need,” you said.

 

“Don’t be ridiculous. No one ever has everything they need. You can’t meant to tell me you like everythingmy secretary picked out for you. I can’t believe your opinions to be so bland.”

 

“I’m very easy to impress,” you told him.

 

Kaiba scoffed. “And here I had believed you needed a ridiculous amount of affection.”

 

“Is your affection so hard to give?” Your voice hardly manifested. “...Or can you only give me things you signed for in the contract? Things I don’t want?”

 

For a second there you were foolish to believe he would say something. Instead he opened to you the passengerdoor of his foreign sports car you could describe in no better detail than being lightening blue and having door which open upwards. 

 

“Watch your head,” he said, aloof, holding his palm over you as he coerced you in.

 

…

 

You would be silent for the drive. There was no sense in opening a conversation which would progress no further than a monologue on your part and humiliating silence on his. If your luck was particularly rotten, perhaps you might provoke a gutting insult.

 

“You’re awfully quiet,” he observed.

 

You could think nothing to counter, and the novelty of not having his words acknowledged by the intended party stirred intrigue. Or at least this was how you could think to rationalize his follow up.

 

“Is something wrong?”

 

You shook your head. “Why would anything be wrong?”

 

“Then why do you look like I signed your death warrant?” he snapped.

 

“I’m tired, Mr. Kaiba,” you responded.

 

“What did you call me?”

 

“Your name, I assumed.”

 

“Are you intent on picking a fight?” Kaiba growled, with a sharp turn of the steering wheel under his palm, pulling over to the side of the road. “What the hell is with you today?”

 

You steadied yourself with a long breath and unclasped your safety belt. “Can you drop me off just ahead? I just remembered there was something I needed to pick up.”

 

“Do you only hear yourself?” he roared. “You always complain about my lack of attention, my work, about wanting a more meaningful relationship. Here I am making an effort! What the hell is your problem?”

 

“This is you making an effort?” You were flabbergasted, to put it modestly. “You’ve done nothing but drag me from place to place running errands.”

 

“I could be at work.”

 

“What does that even mean?

 

“...Say something!”

 

“It means I cancelled a lunch meeting with an American retail partner to play chaperone to your fitting. It means I blew off a circuit inspection of Kaiba Land to take you to a dermatology specialist so the scars your old man gave you don’t become a permanent reminder you carry with you for the rest of your life!”

 

Unclipping his seatbelt he leaned over without warning. Reclining your seat, you found yourself pinned under him, staring into simmering blue. “What do you think I mean?”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Weekend outfit:
> 
> https://pin.it/fmjs4bcqybsjq2
> 
> Valentino dress: 
> 
> https://pin.it/umeqdx5qfrtkq4
> 
> As always, let me know what you think :)


	16. Diamonds & Candy Bracelets

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope everyone has been well! Sorry it’s been a while since any of the fics have been updated, I took a short leave to sort out real life. And since that’s found some order, here you go! This was intended to be longer, but I stopped here because with how things are going, I will keep having to invest more time in other things, and this will never see the light of day. Also, having a half finished draft keeps distracting me from a certain other fic I’ve been promising my co-author I’ll pull my weight on. 
> 
> I also intend to answer every single comment. I’m sorry I’m falling behind!
> 
> So anyway, I hope you enjoy this weird shift of the main character’s dynamic. 
> 
> :)

“I think when I take one step forward you take two back. I think when I ask you what you think of me you change the topic. I think you look down on me because I work for you, because I let you buy me things and put a roof over my head. I never asked for a sugar daddy Kaiba and I certainly never asked to be swept off my feet, all I ever — ”

 

His sardonic laugh severed your thoughts and inspired stunned silence. It echoed against the confined walls of the car, the silken notes somehow all at once rough, raining over you. “A sugar daddy? Is that what I am to you? You have a complex,” Kaiba drawled from above you. “You’re insecure because I spend my money on you. Would you have me lay out a picnic in the park and make you a sandwich? Does that seem more meaningful to you? More balanced? Less like I’m buying sex?”

 

“You’re twisted. Even now you — ”

 

“I what?” he snarled. “I’m twisted? Is that how you see me? Perhaps I am. And money is all I have, so I use it to get your attention.” His next words, and for a long moment his last, were spoken in a bitter whisper. You knew he didn’t want to taste those words so it left you wondering why had spit them out. “It’s the only way I know how.”

 

“...You know, I would still stay with you, even without all of this.”

 

He scoffed loudly, taunting the mere idea. “Nonsense. Where’s the appeal in a man who can’t provide?”

 

“I could look after the both of us,” you said softly.

 

“You’re going to provide for me?” There was a humorous lilt to the question.

 

And foolishly led on, encouraged by this you chirped, “Yes!”

 

“How?” he asked. “By working a minimum wage waitressing job? How do you expect to put yourself through university?”

 

That’s when the tears came, they came, and they wouldn’t stop.

 

“You’re — you’re so condescending!” you screamed. “You’re just like my father! You think I haven’t heard those words before? That I’m useless and an embarrassment because I work for minimum wage? Fuck you Kaiba, fuck you and all you rich bastards who think it’s okay to look down on people trying to make an honest living!

 

“A boyfriend — this is all because I asked if I could call you my boyfriend because in between all your — no, you will listen to me!” you demanded as he motioned to speak. “— All your condescending remarks and putting me down and all these tilted conversations, you give me false hope that maybe I am good enough to be yours. But no. No I’m just a secretary and even that I got because you fuck me. So no the answer to my question is no, I’m not worth your time of day. My personal worth? Well let’s just say it can’t even compare to your net worth.”

 

Your face was hot, your throat strained, and your cheeks were simmering as if held over a boiling pot.

 

Then he spoke. He was self-possessed, and the words all made sense. “A relationship at my age isn’t about holding hands or buying each other fake flowers and candy bracelets on Valentine’s Day. I don’t have time for that kind of childish nonsense — ”

 

“I know where I stand now. And in no one’s eyes will I ever be good enough so just — please just — In the end it was my mistake asking you for something you never intended this to be. Tell me when I’m done paying for your spoiled suit, and I’ll be on my way. And you can find someone without my unrealistic expectations of you.”

 

“If I wanted you to make up for some suit, that debt would have been long collected by now. If that was all I wanted, why would I have wasted ten times — a hundred times that on all of this?”

 

“Boredom? I — I wouldn’t know how the rich behaves, now would I?”

 

“Do I really seem like I have nothing better to do than pamper some inconsequential little girl I picked up off the streets?” Kaiba roared with laughter. “You certainly have a strange understanding of me.”

 

“Some pauper you picked up off the streets. You know I’ve heard that before,” you replied softly. “The man who left me at the orphanage told me that. That he was too embarrassed to admit I was his blood...so he left me there, and when I was found, and taken back home, that I was no different than some street rat who had found her way back home, even after being dumped so far.” You convulsed violently at the recollection, croaking sob after sob, helpless to its ravaging. “Even now, he tells me he wishes I had rotted in that place.”

 

“Except I didn’t say that, did I?” Kaiba asked, tone smoothened to a gentler register, warmer even. He tucked a wispy strand behind your ear. “I said that had you been, you wouldn’t have all of my attention.”

 

“But I don’t have all of your attention,” you cried. “I’m just a distraction.”

 

“How does someone like you have such awful self-esteem?” he muttered. “I’m not so frivolous that I would waste my time with a distraction. If I needed a distraction, I would have paid for an escort. I wouldn’t bother with the emotional commitments of a — a girlfriend and putting her through school.”

 

“A girlfriend?” Nonplussed, you found yourself, as he would say, gawking. There was a certain degree of disbelief, surely you had misheard, misinterpreted, conjured up some lulling alternative to what he had said in defence of the crumbling precipice that was your sanity.

 

And yet he had doled out the label with such discomfort that it seemed so fitting. You didn’t mind the reluctance, and desperation forgave the dispassion. Suddenly, your eyes lit up like fairy lights, childish mirth like some infectious tonic, fizzing to control your whole body.

 

“I’m — I’m your girlfriend? You mean that?”

 

A strange grin marked his lips. “You’re so easy to please. Sometimes I forget why I buy you diamonds, when at your age you’d be just as happy with a candy bracelet.”

 

You threw your arms around his neck, without warning pulling him closer. “You know I’ve never had a boyfriend.”

 

 

“I can imagine.”

 

…

 

At the dermatology specialist, he had not explicitly introduced you as his girlfriend. In fact you received no introduction at all before the receptionist or nurse, and the doctor met you in the absence of Kaiba. The timing had never presented itself, you justified the obscurity he painted you with. It was unfair to discredit him.

 

Descending the steps of the building into the busy streets of downtown Domino, you sought his hand, slipping it through yours. He stumbled, before turning at the base of the staircase, and turning to you with a scrutinizing expression. It was almost a glare.

 

“Sorry!” You immediately recoiled. “Sorry, I got carried away.” You looked down at your shoes, the side of your ballet flats lightly scuffed, marking the style of your walk.

 

He simpered, pleased by god-knows-what, perhaps your reaction, and reached on his own volition for your hand.

 

Reaching with his other hand for his keys he unlocked his car parked only a few feet away. It was a no parking zone, not that the regulation held any authority over the man who could at whim remove the Prime Minster and redecorate his office.

 

As he held the door open for you, you turned, hugging tightly his arm, eyes closed, waiting as it always did for the dream to dissolve. It didn’t, and reaching again into his pocket he retrieved a closed fist. He lifted your wrist, and onto the dainty appendage slipped a roughly strung collection of dusty pastel rocks. You did not understand it. It was almost as if someone had tried to shape the beads into hearts and given up midway.

 

“What...?”

 

“A candy bracelet,” Kaiba said, looking awfully smug. “I couldn’t find plastic roses or a teddy bear.”

 

“Where did you even...?”

 

“A candy store, where else? They don’t sell these at Cartier.”

 

With a firm command to strap on your safety belt, beside you as he drove, he gradually descended into a manic fit of laughter at his own jest. You had seen the wrinkles gathering around his mouth, more and more past each streetlight and by the third traffic light, he was laughing as if he were mad.

 

You enjoyed this expression on him. It was different; it was open. That it was at your expense you didn’t mind. In fact, that you could have enough of an effect to inspire anything in him, made you feel lighter.

 

You turned to lean on your seat, eyes fixated on him as it was most days, though now he was closer. You could almost touch him.

 

It was only a matter of time until he noticed, the open laugh fading into stoic dispassion, and he questioned your curious gaze. To say he was pleased to be its receptacle would perhaps be contrived; even to say that he was intrigued would be. His face was thoroughly inscrutable. But you had been so sure there had been some sort of gleam, an invitation to keep looking — would you be daydreaming if you called it a welcome?

 

Then the feeling grew heavy, expectations weighing louder than your feelings he was willing to reciprocate, and you clamped those runway thoughts shut.

 

He kept his eyes on the road, one hand on the steering wheel, but the other hand never strayed to find you. It just rested on his lap, seemingly unable to find a greater purpose.

 

“What did you need to pick up?” he asked suddenly. He gave no further clarity, until it was obvious you could summon no recollection of what you had said. “Earlier, when we were fighting, you asked to be dropped off so you could pick something up. What did you need to pick up?’

 

In hindsight, what a stupid exit strategy that had been.

 

“It can wait.”

 

“Until?”

 

You said nothing, and his gaze grew stern.

 

“It’s a Saturday. Do you have other plans?”

 

“No but I’m sure you do.”

 

“I’m offering because I clearly don’t.”

 

“My old restaurant. I left a pair of shoes in my bag there.”

 

“That’s it? You lived without it for this long, it can’t be that important. Besides, they’ve probably thrown it out by now. I’ll buy you a new pair of shoes and a bag, I’m sure it’s better than whatever hand me down you owned.”

 

You smiled with bitter resentment at the pitiful accuracy. “I’m sure you can, and you know I got the bag at a thrift store so you’re right. And this is why I said it can wait.”

 

That you had only last week noticed your mother’s family signet ring was not amongst the clutter that had been your life, dumped on the corner of the living room, would likely have afforded him better clarity for this sudden need to revisit a place you had essentially fled, to collect something so trivial.

 

“Whatever. If you’re so attached to it. I’ll take you.”

 

“You don’t need to,” you responded with clear dejection, staring out of the window at the blur of buildings punctuated by trees.

 

“Look,” Kaiba said, the word dangerously bordering a snarl. “I didn’t mean to say your belongings were — my intention wasn’t to look down on you or how you’ve lived your life. It was difficult watching what you _put up_ with in that place. You should have come to me sooner.” Unlike him, the direction of his words were scattered. It was difficult to follow, the retraction of his words switching tracks into some vague confession and then invitation.

 

“No, it’s fine, you’re not wrong,” you said, the response a far cry from a sincere agreement. “It was all hell. I thought I was living diligently but who cares about pride and dignity when it’s only numbers that matter.”

 

“You think you’ve sacrificed your dignity, living with me?” His scrutinizing glare was unbearable as it passed over you for a brief moment.

 

“I slept with a man I barely knew the first second we were removed from the public eye in exchange for — well a way out. Do you think that’s dignified?”

 

“Is that what it was?” he asked. “I was under the impression you had taken a liking to me.”

 

“Are you mocking me?”

 

“Whatever your scruples were about this relationship, bury them. Whatever circumstances we met under are irrelevant. The past is a useless place to be.”

 

“And yet you keep asking me about my past.”

 

“I’ve come to realize that it’s secondary to the person you are in the present. Which is why I proposed a relationship.”

 

You played with the candy bracelet shedding fine dust on your dress already speckled. There was an aching feeling of having misread some clause somewhere.

 

…

 

Parked in front of the restaurant, Kaiba stayed in the car. There was no warning to hurry, or to not waste his time. It was strange, him catering to you. Was it genuine? You had never been introduced to his sincerity, so you were oblivious to the nuances between his well guarded facades and his real self.

 

Inside, you were greeted by a host you did not recognize, and behind the counter, Serenity was training a new waitress. There weren’t many patrons yet, though noon on a Saturday, the weekend lunch rush you could see slowly creeping on the establishment.

 

The general manager approached you cautiously, as if the stretch of tile from the lounge to you was eggshells. There was reverence in his address, this man who on more than the one occasion had admired the curve of your rear with more than just his eyes.

 

“What can I help you with it?” His voice wavered.

 

“I think I left a few things here. I was wondering if they’ve been thrown out or —”

 

“Oh the items in your locked locker. We were — er — wondering if we should contact Mr. Fuguta to pass on the — ”

 

“Sorry, who?”

 

“Fuguta, the gentleman who handed in your resignation. Said he worked for Kaiba Corp. I assumed you were well acquainted,” the general manager replied.

 

“Right, him,” you lied, understanding he was likely one of the many men doing Kaiba’s bidding. “Now, my stuff?”

 

“Right this way to the lockers,” he said.

 

“I know where it is.”

 

…

 

Your lock still firmly fastened on to the corroded lock threatening to give, you found your belongings untouched; one pair of worn loafers, the front gold buckle catching the dim light faded a coppery-silver,and a second-hand bag. You smiled scoffingly at the life you’ve left behind. Each article was a reminder of a life falling apart at the seams. 

 

Ducking your head into the narrow locker, rust chipping and crumbling into your hair, the old leather bag slung from one hand, you searched the darkness for the emerald ring. At a loss, you swept your free arm across the rough interior, fingers tucking into each corner and crevice. You could find nothing but tawny dust dying your fingertips.

 

The locker had not been opened.

 

Was it panic or disappointment which poked a finger into your stomach, you couldn’t decide. Your father had never commissioned your own, so it had been the only affirmation that you had ever belonged in that family. Though it all seemed the slightest bit morbid now, that you would come into possession, succeeding your father of all the rings each member of your family had owned.

 

You met Serenity passing a booth, and returning grudging pleasantries — your unwillingness to converse a sentiment not shared, she was determined to receive a recount of the events preceding your mid-shift departure and all that transpired following, within the span of a few short minutes. A few short minutes because that was as far as your patience would stretch, but Serenity was already settling into the booth and urging you in.

 

 _Supposedly_ , you had had a family emergency, and had needed to leave right away. Also supposedly, the situation at home would not allow you to return. From her bombardment of questions — always while you were mid-sentence — made clear that she was oblivious to the involvement of Kaiba Corp. and your affiliations following. It would stay that way. You assumed Seto would want it to stay that way.

 

Still, it would be a cruel lie if you said that you were not swept with the impulse even for a fleeting moment to boast about your new boyfriend. In the end however, the belief that his arrangement was only a fickle placebo to placate you in order to prolong your use silenced you, and everything but the reality would form into words.

 

The lies came so easily. You wouldn’t even flinch. You could hear yourself speaking, see your loosely clasped hands rested on the table; you were there, but was it you forming those words? They trickled like water,always smooth and uninterrupted, and very vaguely, you were pinched by fear.

 

“You should have reached out to me,” Serenity finally said. “If you were in some kind of trouble, you should have said something. We’re friends, right?”

 

You nodded, forcing an awkward smile.

 

“You said you’re from Tokyo right? It can be difficult when you don’t know anyone. My brother and I have a lot of friends here and our friends are their friends so if you ever need anything, let us know.”

 

“If who needs what?” a jovial voice interjected; a blur of blond hair and denim sliding into the seat beside Serenity.

 

“Oh!” Serenity chirped. “This is my big brother Joey.Joey this is the friend I was talking about.”

 

“The one who upped and left? Ya should have introduced us sooner!” From ear to ear, he was beaming. What amused him, you couldn’t entirely be certain though you decided the goofy grin settled well into his features and shaggy haircut. In a black and white vote, he was good looking, charming even.

 

“Except she...couldn’t have,” you pointed out, speaking very slowly, hoping to allow the paradox of his own request to make itself apparent to him.

 

“Right, right. The name’s Joey Wheeler, duelist extraordinaire!”

 

With a harsh nudge of her elbow against his forearm, Serenity nipped the monologue which would surely have been grand, at the bud.

 

Introducing yourself you smiled. “It’s nice to make your acquaintance.”

 

“Likewise. Say, I hear you’re from Tokyo and that you haven’t been here that long. What do you say I show you around?”

 

“Are you asking me on a date?” you teased, playing along to his tone.

 

If he blushed, it was only slightly. “So what do you say?”

 

“I say it was very nice meeting you Joey. Serenity.” You spared a nod in her direction, gathering your belongings. “But I have someone waiting out for me and so I think I should get going. Again it was so nice to meet you both. We should keep in touch.”

 

Stepping out of the booth, your arm was snatched, and with a swift flick of his wrist, the length of your arm was marked with his name and phone number. _Joey Wheeler_ , you silently read the eccentric font which complimented his personality. _He certainly makes a point to stay on brand._ Why he kept a permanent marker in his jacket pocket you were suddenly curious.

 

“So that you can stay in touch,” he said.

 

“You know, most people would have gone for my phone,” you replied, much too amused by the unsuspecting gesture to rebuke him.

 

He shrugged, slipping his hands into his pockets. “Got your attention,” he quipped. “Sleep on it.”

 

“I appreciate the offer Joey,” you replied. “It was nice meeting you.”

 

…

 

“What the hell is on your arm?” Kaiba was standing outside, leaned against the his car. A firm scowl etchings deep under his dark Zegna sunglasses. Your wrist restrained by a crushing grip, your arm was pulled taut. Plucking the glasses from the high bridge of his nose, deep blue eyes scrutinized the flamboyant scrawl. They grew severe. “Wheeler? Why were you fraternizing with that mutt?” It was ironic that it was his tone which resembled a snarl.

 

“You— you know him?”

 

Leading you by your captured wrist to the passenger’s door, he shielded your head as he pressed you in. Then at a dangerous pace set off towards the establishment, muttering something about the mutt always slobbering on things which did not belong to him.

 

Your hands flew to grapple the door handle to find he had already taken precaution to lock it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, let me know what you think :)


	17. Husband Material

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now this chapter is on the longer side, 6346 words. Long-ish. I just thought, with the shorter chapters we’ve been having lately, a longer chapter would serve more efficiently in moving forward the plot. Now this is also my excuse TSE, for uploading this late today and not yesterday or day before as promised. If any one of you have been waiting for this, thank TSE because without her asking me about this, I would not have made this a priority. I actually spend two full days a time work sitting at my desk and typing this and nothing else. 
> 
> Also, for any of you who listen Dreamcatcher released a new album and so there will be a lot and I mean a lot of references to their songs. The one mentioned here could be any one of them but for the sake of wit, let’s go with ‘Wake Up.’ 
> 
> Anyway, Enjoy and let me know what you think!

Returning he said nothing, though his expression was severe, perhaps more so than it had been when he had discovered the sprawled numbers on your arm. 

 

At first he appraised your arm, the appendage now smeared with a dark smudge — a wet wipe could only erase so much. “Don’t ask,” he said, allowing the steering wheel to spin against the heel of his palm as he reversed.

 

You wouldn’t. You were much too stupidly happy to ruin the moment pressing for information which didn’t concern you. 

 

“Lunch,” he said, the vague invitation accompanied by a heavy sigh after you were a few streets away. “If you have no plans for the afternoon, have lunch with me.”

 

Your reaction was worth recoiling at; some awkward callback to a too far gone schoolgirl in a typical young adult film. It was just that the idea of him dining with you outside the solitude of the ritzy penthouse where he kept you away from the world, in public, was so unexpected and reassuring.

 

If you could hear his thoughts they would be ridiculing you, scorning you for how easy you were to please. And you would tell him a lifetime of being invisible to a family would have that effect.

 

…

 

The name of the establishment you had already forgotten, something unmistakably French, though if you really wanted to know, you could always flip to the very front of the leather bound menu engraved with it on the cover.

 

The dining room of a sought after hotel for the upper class, the walls, as they always were, were washed ivory and adorned with floral mouldings along the many pillars and ceiling. Large mirrors gave the space the illusion of continuing on indefinitely while catching the glint of the numerous glittering chandeliers, each ostentatiously strung with imported crystal. 

 

As nervous as you were, not in the least bit affected by the affluence of the room, rather the man seated beside you in the private booth, away from, though overlooking the white linen draped dining area, you would be lucky not to stain his slacks with the red wine swishing dangerously around your glass in your trembling grip.

 

He was sitting awfully close, an arm snaked around your waist, his breath teased your cheek as he spoke. It was hardly an appropriate distance to be sitting while dining though he seemed entirely unperturbed, with no inclination to move even as the server explained the menu. Throughout her monologue, which for the better part went unheard by him, his lips were harassing your ear. To an outsider ignorant of your situation, as your server was, his uncharacteristic behaviour would easily be misinterpreted as him being taken entirely by you — which was not true. Though how you wished it was.

 

“Stop that,” you hissed, cheeks flushed crimson, or at least they felt that warm. It was obvious the server recognized him. You reached for your menu, sliding it across the table, closer to you. He had not opened his, having ordered the wine from memory. “Are you not going to order?”

 

“Whatever you order will be fine.”

 

Likely an unfortunate moment to have an epiphany of how little you knew of his preferences, you raked your memories through the many — always slightly tilted — meals you had shared over the kitchen counter. “We’re okay for appetizers so I guess...filet mignon for him and duck confit for me.” You turned to him. “Is that alright with you?”

 

The response was hardly a hum nor a grunt. The server excused herself and Kaiba took a sip of his Sauvignon blanc; pensive as he swivelled the glass by its stem against the table.

 

“...What are we doing?” you asked him, a long moment of silence stretching between the both of you.

 

“I was under the impression that I was playing the boyfriend you keep asking of me,” he replied. _Playing_.

 

“After all of that begging,” you asked, “did you finally feel sorry for me?”

 

“You’re hardly someone who deserves my pity, are you?” There was something knowing in his tone.

 

He was haughty, and though he afforded you his undivided attention, he remained inscrutable. Still it was impossible to reserve your personal exultation at being desired, to whatever extent by him; him as a person, and not him as a powerful man of good standing in society.

 

If one could embody being wrapped around another’s finger, it would be you in this moment, childishly captivated by him. You hardly had any attention to spare to your entrée when it was served or anything else which transpired in the dining room at large, having caved hopelessly to how he acted so openly on his attraction to you.

 

He elected himself to cut your confit for you, tenderly slipping the knife from your fingers to his. 

 

“You know if the world ended tomorrow,” you told him, all of a sudden shy, “why does it feel like I would regret nothing?”

 

“What?”

 

Swallowing your lips, fighting the spreading smile was a losing battle. “Nothing.”

 

A man of sharp intellect, he had understood perfectly what you were saying; he could read people to a dangerous degree. And yet he would spare you no satisfaction in affording you affectionate words in return. But you knew that he knew, you were certain he knew, you saw him acknowledge your adoration with a silent curl of his lip; conceited and better than you as he always was. He continued to slice your confit.

 

Sometime during dessert, the server approached to inquire after your thoughts on the course. Kaiba’s tongue well past your lips, to any onlooker at just the first glance, it was an inopportune moment to interrupt. You were practically draped against him, your half-touched soufflé abandoned beside his coffee creme brûlée, surrounded by him. You almost felt sorry for her.

 

Kaiba tossed his card across the table. “Arrange for a suite to be prepared,” he demanded, before promptlyreturning to his ministrations on your lips.

 

From the corner of your eye, the server looked mildly mortified. It was not uncommon for wealthy businessmen to be entertaining with young women half their age, but you weren’t half his age, and Seto Kaiba held a reputation for being as cold as ice to women in particular, so perhaps this was the root of her surprise.

 

You feared for your own reputation.

 

“What do we need a room for?” you asked breaking away, his separation from you not a willing one.

 

“Do you need to ask?” was his reply. Your simultaneous shock and discomfort which boiled to a blank expression required him to elaborate. He wasn’t a man who liked explaining himself, especially not the obvious. “What do couples do when they get a room?” Scrutinizing your reaction he added, “Don’t act so scandalized as if you haven’t done everything there is to do with me.”

 

He wasn’t in the mood for games involving keep away, or your holier than thou attitude, noted. Though your question had been what was so urgent that it couldn’t wait the half an hour drive back to the penthouse. You swallowed it.

 

You weren’t the type to flitter your eyelashes up at him and grate his nerves with contrived giggling as was supposedly customary for every woman on a wealthy man’s arm, and not just according to the movies; you spoke from what you had seen your brothers dragging across the threshold. Kaiba wouldn’t have appreciated it but you certainly felt like you were playing the same part, even as you reserved yourself to silence on the elevator ride up. He held your hand, though beyond this, his other hand casually slipped into his pocket with the room card, he said nothing.

 

Behind the closed door the usual ensued. It had been a long time, and you had missed him, really missed him, so you fought hard to push all the other rubbish scattering your thoughts to the back of your mind.

 

He kissed you all the way down to where your clavicles dipped and bent you over the side of the bed. Reaching under your skirt he slid your panties down your thighs, they fell with a silent rustle to your ankles.

 

Nothing else came off, he lifted your skirt over your back and your palms and fingers dug into the sheets as he thrust into you. At his first stroke you shivered; elbows falling and digging into the bed for support.

 

Being fully clothed, in the isolation of a hotel room, as you surrendered entirely to him, you could not fathom how it could feel so dirty.

 

You could not see him, only hear his hoarse pants in your ear. Occasionally those lips kissed the curve of your ear, telling you that you belonged to him. You would agree, your small voice broken into breathless moans.

 

There was a steadying hand at your hip, another stroking the junction of your thighs, exactly where you wanted him to. The bed rocked against you both, its joints creaking under his force.

 

You could see the city beyond the bed, the room wrapped in glass.

 

He decided it wasn’t right, you were too short. He pushed you on to the sheets and clambered on top of you. His hand gripped at the back of your neck, pressing you into the sheets. He told you he liked you the best like this.

 

He made love to you until you saw white.

 

…

 

Late evening, the room saturated in hues of russet and marigold, the last rays of the sun threw waning streams of light disappearing into the sheets. It highlighted a narrow ribbon from the nest chair by the large glass wall, the gold speckled royal blue carpet, up the side of the emperor sized bed, to your cheek and across your hair fallen over his chest.

 

It was impossible to tell if he had just woken, he always spoke with immaculate clarity, save for the gravelly deepening of his voice which always followed sleep, though that persisted for a while.

 

“You can fall asleep anywhere,” he said. He laughed lightly, and you bobbed up and down on his chest.

 

“This is a bed, isn’t it? I don’t see your point. I’m sleeping on a bed with my boyfriend.” That last word made your heart skip a beat.

 

His breath was coarse against the air.

 

“Seto?”

 

“Hmm?”

 

“If I tell you I remember you...from back then, would that change anything...between us?”

 

If his interest was piqued, he didn’t let on. Evenly droning, “Do you?”

 

“Little bits here and there, not of you particularly but I remember coming out to a playground full of children screaming; blue rust chipped merry go rounds full of kids. There was this melody that played when it was starting to get dark and I remember...I remember someone holding my hand.”

 

“Sounds about right.”

 

At the dispirited sigh you heaved, he moved for a better view of you. “What is it?”

 

“I just thought...I don’t know I was expecting a reaction, a bigger one.”

 

“You should know by now that I’m not one to dwell on the past and that I will no longer ask you to remember yours. If you remember this much, I suppose it’s enough.”

 

“I’m going to go clean myself up.”

 

He helped you shift off of him and pinned you with his gaze through your awkward waddle around the bed, as you tried for your inner thighs not to touch — each other or the dress. You picked up the satchel you had discarded amidst the earlier escapade and locked the bathroom door behind you.

 

You set it down on the bathroom sink and took a long look at yourself; hair dishevelled though passable as some Vogue-It-girl trend, mascara smeared under the outer corners of your eyes, giving the impression of dark circles. It was overall a true reflection of how you felt; an unravelling, disorderly mess strung together by wealth, exactly as they sold on the glossy pages of those magazines.

 

There wasn’t much to rummage through, your wallet sat in the main compartment, along with sunglasses, car keys and your phone. On the inner side pockets you sifted trough the two bullets of Chanel and YSL lipsticks for the sheet of birth control pills.

 

You ran your fingers through your hair, leaning against the counter. Kaiba sure knew the type of woman he wanted, both those lip bullets were brilliant scarlet; the antithesis of demure — or perhaps that was the woman his secretary wanted to be, you couldn’t be entirely sure.

 

You looked with certain scorn at the new sheet of pills, the first sheet out of the box he had given you. You didn’t know why there was a sudden change in prescription, you didn’t ask; it wouldn’t matter. You popped open the bubble seal, twisting the small pink pill between your index and thumb.

 

You twisted it until it cracked. Holding it over the toilet, you twisted it still until it crushed into fine powder, before flushing it out of sight.

 

It may have been a drunken suggestion spewed with certain disdain for you, but the old man may have been on to something.

 

…

 

You had dinner in the hotel room while you tried to convince him for another go around - it wouldn’t hurt your chances but he wasn’t biting.

 

Picking at the tuna tartare, you considered his age, almost thirty — though more specifically twenty seven; you remembered he had asked you not to discount him of three years of his life. You wondered if he wanted children. He seemed more built to be a frigidly withdrawn single unit; which was fine, you weren’t looking for a doting husband, so long as it was him, it would be enough.

 

The daringness of the gambit almost bordered foolishness, though only almost. You weren’t trying to appeal to his paternal instinct, rather the preservation of his and his family’s legacy and reputation. The eldest Kaiba could not afford for the family’s firstborn to be illegitimate. Though then again, neither could yours. The mere existence of such a child was enough to threaten the collapse of empires. Still, you had decided you had wanted him, and despite growing on the outskirts of the family, you had never seen something, always material of course — while living under that roof — that you could not have.

 

It occurred to you that perhaps, such steadfast stubbornness which bled into the realm of entitlement was a product of privilege

 

At once, you couldn’t think of a more fitting match as well as an ill-fitted one to marry the elder Kaiba than yourself.

 

...

 

The next morning was quiet. You set your alarm for earlier than his, though he was immediately awake at the first vibration before the _Dreamcatcher _song had even started blaring. He reached for your phone before you, arching over you, intentionally or otherwise pressing his firmly sculpted chest in your face as he did.__

 

 

 

“What good reason could you possibly have for setting your alarm for half four?” he grumbled, voice fallen a full register.

 

 

 

Even with just this, bleary blue eyes and an expression marked with acute displeasure, you were incandescently happy.

 

 

 

“I wanted to make breakfast for you, and maybe pick out your tie and suit,” you replied, cuddling to his side as he laid back down, arm habitually folded over his face. His other arm had found its way under you, as if in approval of your affection.

 

 

 

“Don’t do things you’ve never done before; if a person changes too fast they die.”

 

 

 

“...Seto?”

 

 

 

You received the same practiced hum you always did.

 

 

 

“Can I come back to work today?”

 

 

 

“If you want.”

 

 

 

...

 

 

 

You slipped into the bathroom first thing after settling in to your office desk. The raging bitch — a title hard earned working alongside a man like Kaiba who pretty much had copyrights to the definition of having a stick up his ass — was yet to grace you with her fruity-perfumed presence.

 

 

 

You popped the second pill from the dull silver sheet and once again snapping it in half, flushed it down the toilet. It indented the pad of your thumb, the tenacious little thing.

 

 

 

Conceiving a baby with the ulterior motive of marriage, as if to hold the man hostage did not agree well with your principles though with marriage an impeding reality on the horizon, you would at the very least afford yourself the liberty of choosing the man in question. You wouldn’t allow the narrative on your own life to be a helpless one.

 

 

 

Not unlike yourself, whether he considered it in the present moment or not, marriage was the only recourse for a man of Kaiba’s status, a man in possession of such a large fortune.

 

 

 

You quoted Austen in your head, _“It was a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in need of a wife.”_

 

 

 

You smiled at yourself in the mirror, humoured by your own lame joke as you flicked your hands of the excess water into the sink.

 

 

 

The fading bruises made your cheekbones under heavy concealer and foundation look grey. It bothered you, though only slightly.

 

 

 

“It’s nice to have you back.” The shrill yet stable voice greeted. It seemed to bounce off the marble bathroom tiles. “I didn’t realize the company allowed vacation time after one week of appointment.”

 

 

 

“I was sick,” you told Miyu as she stood shoulder to shoulder by the sink.

 

 

 

“Of course.” It was a skilled feigning of reverence without overstepping into sarcasm, still, it bit.

 

 

 

Returning only a tight-lipped smile you walked away. It wasn’t worth it.

 

 

 

...

 

 

 

Kaiba had a meeting first thing in the morning, he had told you. He expected you to attend.

 

 

 

You had received a stern lecture on the way to the large, glass wrapped boardroom about how critical it was that you paid attention this time. The man could hold a grudge, though he seemed to have selective memory where it concerned you; you had sat through — very diligently — a handful of other meetings following that unfortunate contraception pill encounter and yet you were still subjected to this lecture.

 

 

 

He had delivered such a lecture and yet his eyes seem to find particular interest in your collarbones against the deep, scoop-plunge of your silver dress. More so, as his marketing team-lead droned on without a single conclusive point on the upcoming game release.

 

 

 

It was increasingly difficult to maintain focus on anything but this oddly intimate moment in a very public arrangement, and through the greater part of an hour, your thoughts had descended from wondering if those in attendance huddled around the great oval desk noticed this discreet affair, to what it would take for you to veer away their gazes. Your cheeks boiled.

 

 

 

Conversely, they were aware enough of their own stares though they were helpless against their own compulsions.

 

 

 

Then all at once he looked away, and he would not look at you again. You fathomed that perhaps he had not been looking at you at all; your general direction sure, though he saw right through you. You on the other hand, had heard and seen nothing else.

 

 

 

You would receive another lecture.

 

 

 

…

 

 

 

A quiet morning seemed impossible. Immediately following the meeting Kaiba materialized at the secretary’s desk, demanding the materials for the prototype and product preview meeting which would be held with the potential distributors he was hoping to launch the game with.

 

 

 

"Sir..." Sayuei hesitated, biting down on her lower lip.

 

 

 

"What?" Kaiba snapped, never one to look kindly upon the slow-witted.

 

 

 

"Sir the lead animation artist has been working remotely to optimize his time to make deadlines and..."

 

 

 

"Get to the point!"

 

 

 

Sayuri recoiled, as if he had just hit her. He had not moved an inch. "We can't reach him. He won't answer our calls or emails. Programming only received the animation and artwork for the first two levels of the game. Those completed levels needed some changes in the artwork based on your recommendations but no changes has been made to the version on our mainframe..."

 

 

 

You could see the detonation now, boiling up his throat, simmering at the tip of his tongue.

 

 

 

"What's his address?" you interjected, a moment before the brunt of his ire could meet the shrivelling girl like a lead pipe. "I'll go to his house and see if I can have the files uploaded. Did he say — how close was he to finishing the last we touched base?"

 

 

 

Sayuri began to speak when Kaiba interrupted. "How exactly will you manage that? Unless you fly there, in this traffic it'll take you an hour to cross the road. And before you ask me, I'm not lending you a chopper to fly to a residential back alley."

 

 

 

"Mr. Sakamoto lives over forty-five minutes away from Kaiba Corp," Sayuri added, handing her phone scrolled to his address. "The round trip will..."

 

 

 

"I only need a one way trip and I don't need your chopper. I'll take care of it. Sayuri keep calling him," you said. "And send me his address."

 

 

 

"Whoever does get in contact with him, let him know he's fired. And I don't care how you do it but have those files in my inbox within the hour or know that everyone who has been running this project is fired also. That includes all of you."

 

 

 

You glared at his receding back for only a moment. Then reaching for your phone you dialled for your branch office.

 

 

 

"It's me. I need a runner," you told the secretary, walking away from Miyu and Sayuri's earshot. "A fast one who's been riding long enough that they won't crash on me to take me somewhere."

 

 

 

"Would you not like a car miss?" the girl inquired politely. "It will be much safer."

 

 

 

"Can you get me a car that can weave between traffic during the morning rush hour? Didn't think our company had made those yet."

 

 

 

"I'll have them contact you when they arrive," she told you.

 

 

 

...

 

 

 

You met the runner in front of the company building. Black jeans, boots, leather jacket and dark helmet; as you expected, so you paid little attention. It was a convincing impersonation though had you spared any thought to detail, perhaps you would have noticed the designer leather jacket and carefully buffed Italian leather boots. The only thought which did permeate your stream of thought was that he was exceptionally tall.

 

 

 

"You're late," you rebuked the young man as he reached for his helmet. "I was expecting you fifteen minutes ago. Did you get the address?"

 

 

 

"Yes," he said, removing the helmet and tucking it under his arm. "I'll get you there in fifteen minutes."

 

 

 

As you saw him, at first you almost laughed, then a severe grimace darkened your face.

 

 

 

"Why the hell is it you?"

 

 

 

"Do you have time to call another runner?" He smugly raised an eyebrow.

 

 

 

"Don't you have a company to run? What the hell are you playing at?"

 

 

 

He held out a second helmet. "I'm offering my fiancée a ride. I believe that's part of my job."

 

 

 

Seething - at how both men caught you between a rock and a hard place - you considered the alternative before swinging yourself on to the seat behind him and pulling on a helmet. He snatched your hands reluctantly grasping at the back of his jacket, wrapping them around him.

 

 

 

"You're going to fall off that way," he said above the revving engine.

 

 

 

"Considering a potential marriage with you," you retorted as he tore away from the sidewalk and into the tight-knit of morning traffic, "I'm considering taking my chances and cracking my head open on the pavement."

 

 

 

"Use that sense of humour to get yourself through it."

 

 

 

All you could think was how desperately you needed to seduce Seto into bed again tonight.

 

 

 

...

 

 

 

The man you met at the front door of the Sakamoto residence was more an unkempt hermit than an employed, functioning human being one would expect to encounter in civil society. You felt the need to confirm you were speaking to the right man. He said he was.

 

 

 

You introduced yourself. "I'm uh - here to collect the files for Mr. Kaiba. I need the hard copy of the files as well as the finished copy uploaded to the mainframe immediately."

 

 

 

He allowed you inside his home.

 

 

 

It was a shame really. They say the best of the creative geniuses were mad. At first glance he seemed slightly unhinged, awkward and downright peculiar though with conversation he softened and grew amicable.

 

 

 

You waited for him to submit his work, shifting your weight uncomfortably from one foot to another, waiting to deliver the news of his termination.

 

 

 

He had lost track of time, he explained earnestly; it wasn't a stroke of defiance or irresponsibility.

 

You could see the despair in the glint of his eyes. He had devoted his life to a company who possessed no qualms in replacing him in a heartbeat.

 

 

 

You slipped your fiancé’s card to him discreetly.

 

 

 

...

 

 

 

"You're going to hopefully get a call from someone named Sakamoto," you told Eiichi, plodding down the narrow steps on to the quiet lane which resembled every other in the suburb. "If he asks for a job, don't ask questions and hire him. And that's not a favour, it's an instruction."

 

 

 

He leaned away from his bike, extending his arm with your bike helmet slung by the tips of his fingers. "Poaching talent are we?"

 

 

 

"He was fired," you explained, snatching away the helmet. "And how do you know who he was?"

 

 

 

"I'm not stupid, I heard you speaking to him."

 

 

 

"Oh?" you called accusingly. "You're speaking informally to me now?"

 

 

 

His smile you had never seen before was almost disarming. He stepped closer"Do you want our children to hear daddy speaking to mummy formally because she's my boss?"

 

 

 

You could feel his breath on your upper lip now; hand cupping your cheek so gently that it almost escaped your notice. Reaching for his hand you held it with your own. "Except," you said, "Seto doesn't speak to me formally, so my children won't wonder why their daddy speaks to me that way."

 

 

 

His smiled dimmed instantly. "You're still not over that schoolgirl crush?"

 

 

 

"I don't recall telling you I planned to get over him. And it's not a crush."

 

 

 

"What?"

 

 

 

"A crush denotes that it is one-sided. Potentially unrequited. He's my boyfriend and I plan to make him my husband."

 

 

 

"He's your boyfriend?" he challenged, snickering. "He said that did he?"

 

 

 

"As a matter of fact."

 

 

 

"I'm sure Kaiba is thrilled to be dating the daughter of the man he cannot bear to breathe in the same room with."

 

 

 

Your gaze darted elsewhere. "He doesn't know does he?" he purred. But of course, he had already known that. It was in every way a threat.

 

 

 

"Take me back to the company," you said, swinging your leg over the bike.

 

 

 

"Yours or his?"

 

 

 

"You know what I mean," you silently replied. 

 

 

 

...

 

 

 

In front of the of the building he helped you off the bike. You held out the helmet back to him.

 

 

 

“Thank you,” you said, offering him a gentle inclination of your head which stood halfway between a bow and a nod of acknowledgment.

 

 

 

“Let me know,” he replied, relieving you of the helmet, “when you’re done being a second priority.”

 

 

 

“So I can be your first priority?”

 

 

 

“Is that funny to you?”

 

 

 

You swallowed your lips, before the reality of his words seeped in and you grew somber. “No.”

 

 

 

As he began to pull away you grasped at his jacket sleeve. “Dinner,” you said as he turned back, “we should do dinner sometime.”

 

 

 

It occurred to you that you weren’t in a position to turn away allies when you had no one in your corner to speak of. He was, regardless of his self-appointment and dubious sincerity, a powerful man in his own right and until the playing field had settled with Kaiba, a cordial relationship was better than hostility. Especially until the field had settled, you could not afford an adversary so close at hand.

 

 

 

“If you moved in with me, instead of with him,” Eiichi said, motioning with his head at the building, “we could have dinner every night.”

 

 

 

“Is that a no?”

 

 

 

“Let me know when you have an opening. And for anything else. All I need from you is a one phone call.”

 

 

 

“Have a safe trip back,” you told him.

 

 

 

…

 

 

 

Recognizing you, the suited security held the glass door open for you. He lowered his eyes in acknowledgement though said nothing.

 

 

 

The transition from rough, warm air grazing all of you except for your head swimming in a mugginess under the helmet, to the cold chill sweeping you down was a welcome one. You savoured it for a moment before beginning to cross the lobby.

 

 

 

You heard your name called. You turned to its source; a young receptionist stood there, an expectant look to her expression.

 

 

 

She spoke again when you were a close enough distance of her to not raise her voice as she had. “A package arrived for Mr. Kaiba. It was delivered here instead of to the mailroom. I was wondering if you could take it up with you.”

 

 

 

“That shouldn’t be a problem. Though...what is it?” you asked her, slipping behind the reception, as a small line of other guests began to form behind you.

 

 

 

There was two other receptionists in all; another young woman and a man, and they seemed to appreciate you not hoarding the front desk space.

 

 

 

“I couldn’t be sure,” the young woman who had called you over muttered, shifting through the contents of the cabinet behind the reception as she sought the parcel.

 

 

 

“If it’s not urgent,” you began to say, glancing nervously at your watch, “could it not — ” An insistent knock against the marble reception behind you interrupted you.

 

 

 

“Excuse me,” a gent impatiently said.

 

 

 

You turned; he was your quintessential businessman in a predictable navy suit, and the other two receptionists were occupied. It would seem incompetent to pass the torch, so while the first receptionist had her head buried far into one of the many polished drawers of the cabinet, you greeted him.

 

 

 

“I’m here to see Ikeda,” he said.

 

 

 

“I beg your pardon,” you replied. It was wholly possible that there were as many as a handful of Ikedas running around the building, so you sought to clarify. “Ikeda from which department?”

 

 

 

He sighed as if he had been burdened with the most gruelling task or as if your comprehension was not worth indulging. “R&D. Obviously.” It may have been accompanied by an eye roll. “The department head?”

 

 

 

“Right, bear with me,” you returned, voice a pitch so polite that you almost didn’t recognize yourself at times like this.

 

 

 

You searched the index of the black binder for the research department. The gent grew restless, rapping his fingers continuously against the stone counter. “We are going to be past my meeting time at this rate,” he complained.

 

 

 

Mumbling a hurried apology, having narrowed down the extension you dialled for Ikeda Touma. It rang out. You dialled a second time and once again you were directed to his voice mail. The third time you rung for his secretary. You were advised he was not in his seat without an explanation for where he could be found. She had hung up before you could advise her of the gentleman before you.

 

 

 

The receptionist was standing behind you now. You apologized again and the gent reached over the counter yanking the receiver out of your hand. He listened for a moment to the engaged beeping. He threw it back to you, something of a snarl rolling from between his lips

 

 

 

“I don’t have all day. Do you plan to have me stand here all day? Is that how your company does business?” he barked.

 

 

 

“No,” came an unexpected voice; conceited and familiar. “We certainly wouldn’t want such an unpleasant fixture terrorizing the lobby.”

 

 

 

The businessman’s displeasure burned to reverence and caution. All at once his eyes fell, and his head followed. The immediate sphere surrounding the reception held its breath.

 

 

 

You could feel a warm, hard chest pressed against your back, one hand reaching for the receiver in your hand on your left, while his other arm dialled an external number, curving around your right. You were hunched forward under his weight.

 

 

 

“Ikeda,” Kaiba barked. “You have a guest at the front desk. Come see me after you’re done.”

 

 

 

Slamming the receiver down against the holder he turned you around. You didn’t possess the liberty nor all of your faculties in that moment to gaze anywhere but at those furious blue eyes, but you could already picture the speculation revving in the minds of all who witnessed this exchange.

 

 

 

“I thought — I was expecting you to be — ”

 

 

 

“In a meeting?” Kaiba asked. “If you those in my employ did their jobs, I would have been.”

 

 

 

“I’m sorry?”

 

 

 

“My office,” he growled. “Now.”

 

 

 

He snatched the parcel you had come to the reception with the intention of collecting, from the trembling hand of the young receptionist and with his other, he seized yours. Marching across the lobby, at his pace, it was impossible not to stumble; it was impossible not to notice the unreserved stares at the forced point of contact.

 

 

 

“Let go of this,” you whispered.

 

 

 

“I don’t think you’re in a position to be giving me orders,” he replied, swiping his card at the barricade of half-glass doors separating the lobby from the employee elevators.

 

 

 

His personal elevator stood out of the way. There was no conversation on the ride up. And the doors opened to his office to reveal Sayuri and Miyu already summoned. Stone statues in front of his desk, they held their hands clasped firmly in front of them. At just a glance they looked afraid.

 

 

 

You stood between them. Kaiba assumed his seat behind the desk, dropping the parcel dully over a pile of neatly stacked papers. Steepled fingers, he leaned forward on to his desk. There was an ominous stir in the air. His eyes passed over each of you, scrutinizingly, derisively, with disgust. It was as if he was speaking to each of you though you could not hear the words.

 

 

 

He inhaled, then exhaled laboriously, the disturbance of air rippled across the quiet room. Somehow it managed to meet each distant wall. For a very long time he said nothing, steepening the tension.

 

 

 

“The distributor’s meeting needed to be postponed,” he explained, “over a project which should have had no complications though why I expected any competency from any of you was my first mistake.” He held his voice low, though always threatening. “The briefing was clear. I asked for three levels ready to be run on a simulator. I lost face in front of two dozen national and international distributors because you could not coordinate a project which was on the cusp of completion. I had,” he growled, “two pitiful excuses for completed levels and another five with only the artwork beyond the brink of salvation.”

 

 

 

All three of you muttered a simultaneous apology.

 

 

 

He called your name, pinching the bridge of his nose.

 

 

 

You stepped forward. “Sir.”

 

 

 

“Is this how you manage your team?” Kaiba thundered. The stack of documents compiled tidily on the side of his desk erupted into a chaos of papers. They assaulted your face all at once; hairlines burned into your cheeks. As the flurry cleared you saw his eyes more clearly, slowly burning to embers.

 

 

 

He reminded you so much of your father. You wondered if his pitch drew lines of scarlet over the healing bruises he had insisted he wanted so much to heal.

 

 

 

“I’m sorry, I was away all of last week — ” you began to say.

 

 

 

“Educating yourself on what was expected of your team in your absence should have been your first priority. Don’t waste my time with excuses to make up for your incompetence and lacking work ethic!”

 

 

 

The expectation was nonsensical. You could feel to sting of tears beading your eyes. “I’m sorry,” you told him, bowing deeply. In that moment you were convinced you owed it to him. All at once you were outraged but he emanated so much suffocating authority in his stance that any thought defying his expectations was unfathomable.

 

 

 

“Do you have a head or do you wear that around for decoration?” his onslaught would not relent.

 

 

 

Deep embarrassment poked a finger in your gut. You were nauseous. You didn’t want to raise your head up. Would you ever recover in the faces of these two women behind you?

 

 

 

Your mind raced through every other avenue. Could you face them as the chairwoman of another corporation; would that be shedding this coat of shame, degradation and revealing your true self or had you lost any semblance of identity chasing after this man? Was disposing yourself into a lukewarm, perhaps even unhappy marriage with your vice-president a more agreeable alternative to this?

 

 

 

You fantasized in those long few seconds, as you imagined many did in their jobs at moments like this, of returning the earlier assault of papers with a razor edged paper of your own; your resignation letter. Granted, it would not cut very deep, he would find your replacement in a heartbeat, but it seemed the most realistic to disintegrating into thin air — it was the only escape within your reach.

 

 

 

You fantasized but as everyone else, you would not act on it. Your pride swallowed like a medieval morning star.

 

 

 

“I’m sorry, Mr. Kaiba, sir.”

 

 

 

Still, you had hoped for more tenderness following the weekend’s development. Though perhaps your greatest reservation, what if you had already conceived?

 

 

 

And what if you hadn’t? Could you then find more comfort in your fiancé?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you think!


	18. Deception’s Irony

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay 5000 words. I was debating on this being longer then decided against it. Let’s see if that last line was too obvious or not obvious enough.

It should not have come as a surprise; it was only an overreaction if not considering the man in question.

 

All this humiliation for a husband. No, this husband, it was to acquire this man as a husband when you could have half the country lining up to take your hand. He was never husband material and you had never expected him to be a doting one, though all this time you had believed, or rather enforced upon yourself the thought that so long as it was him, it would be enough.

 

In the absence of everyone else, you stood unmoved across his desk. The air-conditioner whirred lowly in the silence of the now almost vacant room, save of course for you and him.

 

It was always you and him, standing in some confrontation at the edge of a cliff. You always on the utmost edge, giving him the power to crumble the precipice.

 

"You know I did nothing wrong," you said, indignant though it never simmered to a boil.

 

"As their supervisor, I expected you to have read what was expected of your title better," was his staunch, cold reply. Did he with any sincerity stand by these words?

 

"If you had better advised me instead of only needing me as -- "

 

"Don't bring what we do in the bedroom into every discussion. I think you capable of keeping private affairs separate from - "

 

"I'm not feeling too well. I need the day off."

 

"Do you think being my EA is a joke?" he sneered.

 

"The role or its premise?" You raised an eyebrow.

 

He swallowed the growl which rose in his throat, his Adam's apple bobbing prominently. He leaned forward on steepled fingers. "Fine," he said, "have it your way. Come back tomorrow with your head on the right way."

 

"You know Seto," you said turning to him after you had already walked halfway across the room. As indifferent as he was, you had learnt he listened attentively when you called him by name. "This - we aren't...working out are we? What I kept asking you. Forget it ever happened."

 

He would not say anything, though behind narrowed eyes he wondered, did you think him so easy that he would be persuaded each time you had a change of heart.

 

...

 

You met Eiichi a bus stop away from the building. He looked more familiar in a suit, more believable, if that made sense; the red Astor Martin a juxtaposition.

 

He asked where you wanted to be taken, and for a while in the absence of direction he drove idly. You appreciated the silence he afforded and his reserved companionship. You asked to be taken to his apartment. You learnt that in spite of his rare display of expression and perhaps inclination to be taciturn, he did not actively practice being undecipherable. At least, not all the time. He turned to you with the surprise the request had inflicted plain on his face.You worried that he would ask for an explanation for this. He did not.

 

His apartment was neat, cubic and perfectly sorted in every hue of monochromatic grey one could discernibly separate the pigment to. It was as if the front cover of an avant grande lifestyle magazine had been torn and plastered in front of you. You stood in the entry way, afraid of smudging the glossed tile or glassy interiors. It was vast, and you could not find one inviting place to sit.

 

He offered you his house slippers, apologizing for not having another pair. He had not received any guests since he had moved here from Tokyo, he explained, and he did not see it a likely that he would, at least willingly, anytime soon.

 

This hostile approach to visitors prompted you to ask if he considered you a nuisance.

 

"No," he quickly replied, "of course not. I even asked you to come live with me. Hardly would have made such a personal request if I felt you too difficult to share a space with for such short time." You seem unconvinced, and even less assured, so he added, "I fully expect to find glitter throw pillows and pink shower curtains taking over this place." You did not respond with humour as you were aware you should have, and he grew pensive. "Maybe then it would feel more like a home."

 

He had advanced a few steps into the living room and putting off the idea of waiting for another invitation, you followed, treading into the glass wrapped room basking in afternoon sunlight.

 

"Would you like me to draw the curtains?" Eiichi asked you.

 

"Just the one side." It was starting to feel hot even against the cool rush of wind the air conditioner blew.

 

"I would stay with you and work from home," he said apologetically, "but there's a meeting -"

 

"With IMG International I know."

 

Again, he seemed surprised, though made no remark after it, likely not wishing for it to be delivered in a way which would be condescending.

 

"It's fine," you said.

 

"I'll come home early."

 

You nodded. It was strange, he felt like radio static, he even stood an official distance away. He was just plain grey static, you realized and Seto was a deep surge of adrenaline.

 

...

 

Eiichi was like a pretty porcelain doll, perfectly groomed, handsome; something he shared with Seto, except that dangerous edge he seemingly possessed was practiced, while Seto was wild, and the unpredictability was exhilarating but you had grown sore, and tired. You needed confidence and no matter how you asked, Seto was never willing.

 

It could hardly be called a conclusion but this was what you had come to understand sitting alone staring down at a city diving head first into the twilight dusk with no thought of grinding to a halt at the cover of dark.

 

They shared another eerie familiarity, you had learned, neither ever came home when the promised they would. It should have spoken a lot of how they regarded you, you realized, and waiting every night, your whole life, for either husband to come to you seemed like a wasted life.

 

You would live as you pleased. And why wouldn't you?

 

...

 

Dinner had been this dysfunctional game of reverse musical chairs where each time Eiichi's phone rang he would vacate his seat for many number of minutes, return, and then leave again for a longer time the next his phone rang. It had devolved eventually to dinner alone, and you resorting to slip away to the comforts of the sofa, to watch the tele while you picked at your pasta.

 

He seemed apologetic to you when he finally resolved to turn his phone off for the night and you were just the slightest bit unhinged from one too many glasses of red wine with an absurd alcohol percentage. Seto would never have allowed you to progress this far, you entertained amongst your inebriated thoughts, he was much too precise and watched over you consistently.

 

"I wasn't expecting it to be today, when you suggested dinner," he said in excuse. "I would have better made time."

 

"Are you not going to ask me? Why I suddenly barged in? What happened with Seto?"

 

"Even when we're married, I don't expect you to tell me every detail of your life, only ones that are important."

 

"People are never so generous unless they have their own details they want left unquestioned," you slurred in counter, though surprisingly coherent.

 

"I don't have time to form details outside of work. Though I must warn you, an extra-martial affair will cause people to talk, especially with the likes of a man like Kaiba. So I do hope you resolve whatever there's left of it before. I'm confident I can be a good husband to you."

 

"As long as you don't hit her, I'm sure with your position and background you could be a good husband to any woman out there."

 

"And you're an exception?" he questioned.

 

"No," you said sighing. "I'm sure given the chance you would be...a fair choice."

 

...

 

 

You shouldn't have helped yourself to another half a bottle of wine, you were certain of it now. It was obviously what had possessed you to take off your dress, slip under the covers and invite he join you in his own bed.

 

He wasn't sleeping, neither were you, nor was the city. He smelt of cool shower gel, and you of day old perfume.

 

You were learning now that it was not the premise of being in bed with a man, rather the man involved which mattered; his fingers grazing up and down your bare midriff as he was pressed against you from behind was as exciting as the erasers of a lead pencil circling your skin. You felt nothing; he inspired in you absolutely nothing.

 

"I could get used to this," he murmured, pleased, or so you interpreted in your drunken haze.

 

It felt oddly empowering to be on the receiving end of an affection you did not requite. You wondered if Seto felt the same.

 

...

 

Mornings were always early with these men, only Seto had mastered the method of slipping away unnoticed. Waking up, you had searched for his scent turning over and was disconcerted by its replacement.

 

The need for Kaiba had burgeoned past that of a craving into a longing, now only made clear by this brief and undefined affair with Eiichi. His mere presence, the brush of a hand made your hair raise at attention, all the while instilling you with a deep calm.

 

It was suicidal, you were a masochist, you told yourself, dragging yourself across the bed.

 

It was satisfying then to see his name flashing repeatedly across your phone screen, one after another, over a dozen missed calls spanning all hours of the night and early morning. Content, though also frightened at what fresh hell awaited you at the end of the line, you resolved to face whatever he was intent on unleashing your way in person; his handful of messages inquiring with increasing urgency where you were you thought would be no more than a mild preview.

 

Eiichi had left you the pyjama shirt he had not worn all night to wear around the house. It would serveyou as a dress.

 

Following the wafting scent of bacon and eggs, you found Eiichi in the kitchen in his blue pinstripe pyjama pants, standing over tomatoes frying on a hot pan.

 

"Do you have time to be doing this?" you asked him as you came to stand beside him.

 

"Can't leave you here hungry. Besides, I never wake up this early otherwise," he told you. He reached for the collar of his shirt you wore, flipping it out. "You look better in my own shirt than I do," he said, focusing on the crisping tomatoes tossing in sputtering butter.

 

"I'm...not staying here today."

 

The spatula skidded to a halt against the pan and he looked at you. "Are you going back to work then?"

 

You nodded.

 

"I see."

 

"Thank you, for putting up with me last night. And for waking up early to cook me breakfast. I really appreciate it," you said.

 

He said nothing to acknowledge you, and as with when one's outstretched hand is not accepted for a shake, you felt self-conscious.

 

"My parents want you to come over for dinner sometime. My mother especially is particularly fond of you, which is more than I can say for my younger brother's wife."

 

"Tokyo is just a long drive away," you said. "But I didn't know you had a brother, or that he was married."

 

"You've never asked. He married his high school girlfriend. She was my father's secretary's daughter. Our family didn't approve. I suppose he figured that being one of the younger siblings that it didn't matter what he did. He would never be in-line for anything important."

 

"Hardly matters when the company won't be yours either?" you questioned. "There could hardly have been a line of succession for who would potentially get to marry me if that can even be considered in the same way as an inheritance."

 

Whether you had offended him or gotten too close to unraveling him he fell silent.

 

"...Could it?" you pressed him for an answer.

 

"Would you like to eat in the dining room or living room?" he countered, his sudden need to distract cocooning some suspicion you weren't completely conscious to in the far recesses of your mind.

 

"Wherever is fine."

 

...

 

You weren't looking to make a public announcement of having slept away from home so you asked to be left at your apartment.

 

The sheets had been slept on, Seto had likely come too late in the night to drive himself back to the mansion upon discovering your absence . He had not taken breakfast, only an empty coffee mug sat in the sink.

 

Even in the empty spaces he left behind, there was an electricity in the sheets, in his lingering scent, and it filled some inexplicable space that Eiichi left to be desired. You couldn't quite say, but it was essentially the essence of him.

 

You hoped that from the myriad of calls he had left that he had not received your vague deliverance of a break up monologue with any seriousness. Still, he was much to keen to have not understood your implication and you had learnt from your time with him that he would not look the other way so easily. So the question remained, did he need to be won back?

 

...

 

He liked the dress you wore; a short, black and white lace one piece with a peter pan collar. It was the first thing Seto had said, that it suited you. You were standing in front of the reception desk, Miyu and Sayuri behind you. It would have been a compliment had it not so plainly been a statement of possession; he had bought you that dress.

 

He asked you into his office. It was the most civil he had been; you had no illusions of it lasting very long.

 

In his office he was faced away from you. "Where were you?" he asked in a tone which said you were pushing his patience. But you knew better that it had already long thinned and snapped.

 

"At a friend's."

 

"Is that right?" He spun on his heel.

 

"Is there a problem with me staying at my friend's or does that also fall into the realm of things I need to report my boss?" You bit down on your lip but the words had already left you. So much for reparations.

 

"No," he said exhaling rigidly, "but I imagine it's the sort of thing that you tell the man who was up most of the night looking for you."

 

"What?"

 

"...I was worried — concerned for your safety."

 

Nonplussed, quite like he had been the day before, you stood rooted to the spot against the closed door. "Why?" you then asked in a small voice, desiring, in spite of all the resolve you had built to just accept him as he was, to know where you both had left off in his mind. "Because you like keeping a tight inventory on your belongings?"

 

"No, because when my person goes missing it becomes my responsibility. Do you understand that?" he asked, stepping closer and searching your face. "You're my responsibility now."

 

How simple or stupid were you for him that this was all you had been waiting for, you asked yourself, why was it enough? Why did it not matter if it sounded like a well practiced script?

 

You felt the need to apologize, it was the effect he had on people by merely breathing a few inches apart from them. And yet he was faster. "I'm sorry," Kaiba said. "Yesterday, it wasn't my intention to..."

 

Hurt me, you wondered, humiliate me?

 

Instead he began a new train of thought. "I should have been on your side. Perhaps it was me who needs to better understand my duties to you."

 

It was always a possibility that you had stumbled and hit your head, or that you had accidentally stepped through some prototype dimensional transporter he was tinkering with; it was all possible except his sincerity.

 

You watched him with agitation dancing in your eyes. He read them quite plainly.

 

"My decisions carry weight," he said, "consequences far beyond your comprehension so understand that my decision to initiate a relationship with you can't be overturned by something as petulant as a childish tantrum."

 

Arms outstretched you took a step towards him, closing the space. Your open arms slipped under his suit jacket and wrapped his waist. Your rested your head carefully against his chest. It was always safest when he didn't regard you as an opponent.

 

"You just said you were sorry for making me upset," you said with a childish pout he watched over amused.

 

"I am, but your reaction should never be so easily affected by someone else's treatment of you.That's letting them win."

 

"I don't mind losing to you," you murmured, holding him tighter. ...Or the illusion of it.

 

...

 

Seto inquired after your breakfast, and you told him yes, your friend had sent you off with a homemade breakfast. It seemed to gall him, as if you had given him the wrong answer. You shifted your weight uncomfortably as he made you stand across from his silence on the other side of his desk. Picking up the receiver he asked for Isono to bring you a smoothie or a protein shake; you were looking gaunt, Seto had said. Nothing for him, just for you. When your polite refusal was met with a stone wall, you managed to negotiate lychee jelly into a mango smoothie. It was the tiny victories.

 

Minutes before lunch he informed you of a meeting noticeably absent from his schedule. It was a personal one he had said, though business none the less. He believed it would be of interest to you.

 

He would only allow you time to retrieve your phone from your desk before whisking you off to an establishment distinctly French. The details of the meeting was still unknown to you and for a period embarrassingly long, you deluded yourself into believing that he was initiating an impromptu date.

 

Seto greeted the gentleman already seated, and as you passed him to your seat in front of him, the delusion shattered, along with much of your ability to maintain yourself on your feet. It would seem Eiichi was equally surprised.

 

Eyes made contact with each other in consecutive sequence as if passing electricity sparking at each junction of a circuit. Seto made a formal introduction of you to him, and him to you. He followed your last name with the total of his girlfriend. It was difficult to discern exactly which part of this interaction made the air around the table so thick. You all sat down, and Seto sat especially close.

 

"I'm sorry I wasn't available to accept your invitation right away Kaiba, I was late in getting to the office. You see, my fiancee came over last night and..." he paused, clearing his throat. He opened his menu, taking Seto's lead. "And well...you can imagine. It was hard to leave her alone in bed before she woke up and then she wouldn't let me go."

 

Your breath stifled; your chest rising then finding it unable to fall back down.

 

_The liar._

 

You understood that what cornflour was to a soup, this betrayal was to this air. Or perhaps that was a euphemism. Maybe it was cyanide.

 

"I wouldn't know," was Seto's response without missing a breath, "I sleep with my girlfriend every night and yet punctuality has never been a problem."

 

The remark was of such a crude quality unfitting his usual disposition thus more so, you had not been expecting it. The atmosphere was ambiguous. Eiichi didn't flinch at the comeback, though his eyes stole a glance over your tensed form. What had inspired Seto to respond to it so personally?

 

Then all three pairs of eyes fell over their respective menus.

 

Seto ordered a pricey bottle of wine, and before you could request a separate order for a drink, he had already asked you to peruse the menu for something non-alcoholic. "I don't need you falling over yourself in the office after this," was all he said.

 

He was considerate, you would attribute it to him being concerned; concerned of you or his own convenience would be discussion with yourself for a later date.

 

It appeared neither party, following the quick fire of words had any willingness to speak, and it was with unconcealed hostility that the conversation differed to discuss particulars of their partnership in the works.

 

Meanwhile, you browsed the menu in silence, ordered in silence and the proceeded to eat in silence.

 

It was nice outside, you remarked to yourself, pinning the inside chill on the air conditioners right above. Looking idly at the busy road past Seto, you scrutinized by your lonesome the ensembles the strangers wore; in the summer, wedges and miniskirts became a brand to Domino girls. You had counted seven so far. You could easily herd them together and pretend they were a girl group.

 

A hand closing over yours called you to attention. Seto had asked you a question.

 

"I'm sorry?"

 

"Are you cold?" he asked.

 

You motioned to answer but he was already removing his suit jacket. Inclining your head from habit, you grasped at the lapels as he draped it over your shoulders, leaning closer to you than was necessary. It was heavier than you'd remembered your brothers' being. It would take you a moment to realize his wallet and phone were still inside.

 

For a moment your eyes crossed Eiichi's across the table before passing away.

 

There was a tangible stench of toxic masculine competition.

 

...

 

After lunch Seto cancelled an internal meeting to take you somewhere he would not say.

 

This street he pulled up to was familiar; white washed buildings, polished marble steps and extended awnings. It was not Thursday yet, you were confused.

 

It made more sense as he led you by your hand to a jewelry boutique and asked you pick anything which piqued your interest; all of it if it pleased you though he said that he did not mean to insult your discerning eye.

 

"I don't want anything," you whispered, tugging at his shirt sleeve, his jacket still on your shoulders; standing it reached as far down as your dress.

 

"I don't believe that was an option," Seto husked lowly, before strolling casually through the maze of cabinets and glass showcases, appraising the diamonds on display. "This one," he said, pointing predictably to the first blue stoned piece he encountered; a sapphire choker bound by diamonds.

 

"It's too much," you refuted.

 

And just as easily his pride was scuffed, so he turned, and bade the sales girl who had been following and listening to you refusing him, over. "This set," Seto said, "and anything which would suit her."

 

"Pearls," the young women replied, always holding her head low, "have become quite fashionable for young women recently."

 

“Do you like pearls?” he asked you.

 

You stuttered, feeling suddenly ambushed. It was nervous habit. You owned a few in your personal collection, having inherited more from your mother.

 

He saw this as affirmation and ordered for whatever you found suitable to also be wrapped up.

 

At the counter he asked you for his wallet, earning a look which itself was confused between one of curiosity and reverence as you handed it to him a second time since the restaurant. The first time had also received a similar reaction from the waitress. He handed the wallet back to you at the end of the transaction.

 

Driving home, he said he couldn’t understand your pointed silence. Reaching into your purse you retrieved the candy bracelet he had given you and slipped it past your wrist. He shifted his gaze to you from the road, brows drawn together.

 

“You still have that tacky thing?”

 

“You wouldn’t know it but this means more to me than any of those diamonds sitting in the trunk,” you said to him in response. “Because you invested thought into it and you meant for it to be for me specifically.”

 

“I was mocking you for being a child,” Seto countered.

 

“Yes but you wouldn’t give it to another girl, would you?”

 

“What? What woman would want that?”

 

“Exactly!” you chirped, turning to him. “It’s not a cookie cutter sort of gift, you know? It’s the thought too.” You played with the candy beads, smiling to yourself.

 

You felt his eyes hover over you in study. “The thought...hmm,” Seto said, as if mulling the thought.

 

…

 

Past the white stone boutiques melding into residences, usually upscale townhouses, and past the flagpoles being replaced on wrought iron balconies by overgrown greens tumbling, at the junction he took the wrong turn, driving away from the company building.

 

“Are we going somewhere else before going back to the office?” you asked him, having waited another few streets for an explanation.

 

“To the apartment,” Seto answered, “and I wasn’t planning to go back to work today.”

 

“Are you going to work from home then?” _Home_ was probably not the correct term but you hoped you had conveyed your idea.

 

“Do you want me to?” he asked you, always looking ahead.

 

“No...but I didn’t think that’s something my opinion would matter in.”

 

“Your opinion matters a lot more than you may think.”

 

It was impossible to keep up with him.

 

…

 

Seto stepped in carrying the bags behind you. He locked the door behind him and asked what you would have for dinner.

 

“We just had lunch,” you responded, finding the inquiry odd.

 

“What do you want?” he repeated.

 

“I — I don’t know, I usually go with whatever I’m craving at the moment and if not you usually decide, so...”

 

“Do you...want me to cook for you?” You wouldn’t know what was more bewildering, the question or how it has been forced out against an expression contorted so thoroughly against the idea.

 

“What?”

 

“Never mind, it was a moronic suggestion,” he said, stalking off in the direction of the bedroom as he loosened his tie.

 

Seto made it so far as the doorway before turning on a second thought and walking to you with an equally stiff stride. Reaching you he slipped his fingers into the breast pocket of his jacket and recovered his phone and wallet.

 

You waited for him to pull away, but his breath kept falling over your hairline. He watched you with an unnerving stillness for a long collection of moments before, as if having found what he was so vehemently searched, he leaned down to you, and tilting his head, his cupid’s bow brushing yours, your noses touching, he pressed a kiss against your lips parted in surprise.

 

When there wasn’t enough air, he removed his lips from yours and pulled your head to nestle under the curve of his neck, bundling you against his chest. There wasn’t hesitation between his movements, like his limbs needed an oiling, but you wanted to think that it was the closest he had kept you.

 

…

 

 

At your request, and in response to his inquiry on how you wanted the afternoon to be spent, at the lack of imagination you had suggested a movie. It would be at home of course because you had already changed into a loose button up dress, pulled your hair into a bun and allowed your make-up to smudge.

 

Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette, you hoped the politics would keep him engaged in spite of the eccentric retelling.

 

You had confiscated with his phone, and he had parted with it willingly. It did not escape your notice that since the weekend and especially beginning this morning, he allowed a great number of things to your whim willingly. 

 

“I don’t believe in political marriages, or ones to secure business,” told him as you watched the wedding banquet scene of Marie wedding Louis, cuddled to Seto’s side. It was only a half lie when coupled with your next remark, “Marriage should be a personal thing. The way Queen Victoria married Albert.”

 

He hummed in thought. “Albert died and left her a widow for most of her life.”

 

“Oh I know but they had so many children. And Queen Elizabeth also married for love and those two are almost a hundred!”

 

“Children?” Seto asked, somehow of all things, his attention piqued by that portion of your sentence. “Do you want children?”

 

“I mean I want your children,” you said, following with an innocent giggle to hide the sincerity as you craned your neck to look up to him.

 

Holding the remote up to the screen he paused the movie. “I didn’t realize you were into that kind of play,” he said in some dark tone which made you swoon as he lifted you to his lap by the crook of your underarms. He began to casually unbutton your dress, a smirk animating his lips. “Let me help you with that.”

 

Sometimes the most deceiving ulterior motives were best left in plain sight.

 

…

 

He crossed the living room to the bedroom, carrying you from the sofa where you had fallen asleep. He wouldn’t attempt dressing you in a night dress or pyjamas; though he had much practice changing from when his brother was sick, instead pulling the comforter high up to your neck so you wouldn’t be woken by the cold draft.

 

It was dark outside now. Still, as Seto passed the windows to the bathroom, he left the tall curtains undrawn.

 

In the bathroom, as he reached for the toilet seat, crumbled pink dust staining the porcelain caught his eye. It appeared to have been half wiped away, and had he not been paying attention, it would have easily slipped his notice. Seto’s eyes narrowed as understanding presented itself to him.

 

He wiped what was left of the crushed tablet away, and propped up the seat.

 

It amused him a great deal. It was interesting, he thought, how sometimes the same intention played against each other in contradiction.

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me hear your thoughts! 
> 
>  
> 
> Also, hi to Est who’s defintiely not reading this. -_-


	19. Questionable Prospects

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Starting writing these, my life was in a weird place, a standstill of sorts, if you will and I had nothing but time and anxiety to fuel these but everything is sort of starting again and I may not have all the time I use to, to write these. That being said though, this is still a quiet corner I like coming back to and hopefully all of these stories will get an ending! Thank you for keeping up with this stories. Today it has been exactly an year since I started writing and I wish I could have finished all the pieces I was hoping to as a present but instead, I hope you enjoy this for now — it's not the most outstanding chapter — until I finish the ones I wanted to as a way of thanking all of you who have and continue to leave comments and like my stories. If You Want Romance was supposed to be like 3 chapters until I got it out of my system but we came all this way because of all your love and comments! Thank you, whether you've been here since the beginning or just starting. Thank you so much! And as always, I will get to every single comment, even if it seems to take what seems like months at a time!
> 
> This chapter was supposed to be a transition chapter which is why I think I struggled so much with it. I tried to put a lot of substance and plot and it felt disconnected and very far removed from the the story. And also as in real life, stories can't always be dramatic so...sometimes they're ordinary and frustrating and things aren't going anywhere for quite some time. I hope I captured that suspended feeling or standstill well in this chapter.

 

A scandal involving a minor and a senior director of Kaiba Corp. had left company stocks in a precarious position for the better part of the day and had done less than recover by market close. The incident turned heads to Seto and what the media had dubbed overnight, his nonexistent relationship prospects, accusing him of failing in his leadership to set even a substandard example let alone an outstanding one, of being a settled, family man. Why a young man in his late twenties needed to define the paradigm of fidelity, morality and familial values for the generation before him was beyond you, though your opinion had done little to ease his indignation.

 

What would they know about his relationship prospects, Seto had said, pitching his tablet at a wall and slamming his open palms on his desk, heaving as if a provoked bull, he had you. It had meant a great deal to you, even if the embrace which followed had been spine crushing.

 

Seto wouldn't say anything coming home. You sat beside him quietly in the moving car, your hand on your open lap, his on the empty space in between. His eyes were closed but you could see them moving underneath.

 

"How long do you plan to stare at me like that?" he asked without ever opening them.

 

"I—"

 

"If you want to move closer, do it."

 

You chose to just reach for his hand, squeezing, then holding it with yours. His eyes opened and fell to the sudden connection. His lip curled at what circled your wrist.

 

"Anyone would think you were seeing a grade schooler."

 

"With your temper tantrums, it would be an honest mistake," you replied from instinct. Your quick wit and dry humour you made an effort to suppress in his company to match his taste perfectly, and so at the realization you recoiled. "Sorry."

 

"At least you have a decent sense of humour," he said, "though I can't say I appreciate that it is at my expense." A long silence endured. You couldn't say it was comfortable. You met the driver's eyes accidentally in the rear view mirror; as always it darted away like flung marbles.

 

"Of course I'm sure there's a lot about you that you play keep away with," he said, expression serene.

 

You watched him with some mild horror. He continued. "It would do more to endear me to you if you dropped the act."

 

There was a frog in your throat, or was it just your heart?

 

"Seto I don't know what you — " Your phone screen lit up distracting you, and a message from Eiichi made itself known; there was a full board meeting next week. A proper welcome of sorts for thenew chairwoman.

 

"As you are you seem to have very little personality. And that's not the girl I met."

 

You took in a shaky breath and nodded. "Yes it seems that way doesn't it?"

 

"It's irritating," he said.

 

"What is?"

 

"Everything about you."

 

You mumbled at that, some incoherent response which was neither oh, or I see.

 

...

 

A board meeting next Wednesday, likely your father would be in attendance. You stood dumbly at the front door as Seto entered the door code from behind you, having swatted away the clumsy attempts of your distracted fingers dragging across all the wrong digits; causing irritating beeping to worsen his migraine. He pushed it open with a force, arm over your shoulder and pushed you forward into the apartment coming to life at your entrance. Stumbling in you reached back from habit for the door handle. Your wrist caught on some obstacle, and again from habit, you made to retrieve your hand.

 

There was a hiss, you felt Seto's hand intervene but your insistence on pulling apart overwhelmed his effort and a shower of scattered taps against stone echoed. A light burning lingered on your wrist. As your attention came to, your eyes moved from piece to piece the pastel candy drops littering the floor.

 

It was silly to cry over a tacky bracelet — that was his voice in your head. For a moment you could form no reaction of your own, not believing it, or perhaps searching for a way to travel back to a point before it ever happened.

 

"Now look what you've done," Seto growled, dusting the suit jacket draped over his arm your bracelet had caught on to the button of.

 

He threw his jacket over his briefcase set against a corner of the entryway and began untying his shoes. You continued to stand there, fixated on your broken bracelet. Then abruptly at a thought you knelt down, gathering the nearer candy drops into a pile. There was a drumming in your chest, that dreadful feeling when you were half convinced that you would not be able to salvage it.

 

"What are you doing?" Seto asked the obvious, no, snarled.

 

You were gasping lightly with each breath, the Valentino satchel dropped somewhere as you crawled over the cold marble in search of the scattered pieces.

 

"What are you doing?" he repeated the question at the absence of any acknowledgment, clutching your shoulder.

 

"I can still fix it I — I just need new elastic and — "

 

"Fix what? A pocket change bracelet?"

 

You snatched your shoulder from his grip, adding one by one to your growing pile of candy drops. Defiantly continuing on on your hands and knees, Seto stepped forward with you, reaching again for you. There was an unmistakable crushing under the sole of his sandal and you froze, eyes fixed on the distance. As he lifted his foot you turned your head to look and tears boiled over at the smeared trail of powder.

 

You sat up crossing your legs, the crumbled mess left of the candy drops you had collected into a pile in front of you. "Now look what you've done!" you aimed his words back at him. Throwing your head up to the ceiling, the tears burning cold past your cheeks, you held in the instinct to scream.

 

Sighing, "Why does this mean so much to you?" he asked, scraping the underside of his sandal against the step leading up from the foyer.

 

"Because you gave it to me!" you yelled up at him. "Because even though it's a — to you it's a nuisance on the underside of the your shoe, I liked it!"

 

"I'll buy you another one at some cheap stationary store if it meant so much to you," he said, recovering from his daze. "I'll buy you the copyright and trademark to the damn thing so stop crying over some broken pieces of shit candy."

 

"You can't replace it!" you screamed back in reply. It was shrill and scraped at every wall of your throat. "It was special! Not everything is about money, when will any of you men realize that?" You pitched a punch which didn't quite reach at his leg. "I could buy that damn copyright myself if I wanted to but this isn't about that!"

 

"Fine, then cry — What?"

 

"What?" you snapped in retaliation, grasping at the crumbled pieces.

 

"Never mind," he said, shifting up his trousers and kneeling in front of you.

 

You slapped away his hand reaching for your face. "Don't touch me! I don't need you invalidating my feelings and telling me I'm overreacting!"

 

"You're surprisingly more tolerable when you're screaming at me," he mumbled. "I'll take care of this. Get up and have a shower. That's the tiredness talking."

 

"How are you going to fix it? You ground it into dust!"

 

"Believe it or not I've put together worse. Now get up." When he was making an honest attempt to lift you off the floor, even your most violent thrashing would not stop him, you knew. So you let yourself be lifted off the ground, and grudgingly wrapped your legs around him.

 

"You're honestly so awful...but at least you don't smell like smoke and whiskey."

 

"You need to find higher standards for men," he replied turning his head to yours buried in his neck. "Otherwise it's an insult to me."

 

...

 

You had huddled up on the couch after dinner with a comforter, a pint of ice cream and a pre-recorded episode of The Great British Baking Show your companion. You felt his presence hover behind you for a few moments before he walked around to sit across from you. He popped a pill in his mouth and took a sip of water. The atmosphere at dinner while civil had seen you reserved and without the will to be forthcoming, which, at a dinner table across the likes of Seto Kaiba, was a long, silent one. He pulled on your palm to open and placed a pill. Then he handed you his glass of water.

 

"What is it?" you asked disinterestedly.

 

"Vitamins."

 

"Vitamins?" You looked at him with as much confusion as the reply deserved.

 

"Yes, I told you, you're starting to look gaunt."

 

"I didn't know you — then again why wouldn't you." You swallowed it and cringed at how it gouged your throat, then soothed it with a spoonful of ice cream. "Thank you...I guess, for paying attention to my health."

 

He grunted, and rubbed his palms twice over on his thighs, then rose to his feet.

 

"Is everything okay?"

 

He turned to you with a vengeance at that. "Why wouldn't it be?"

 

"...Are you...are you waiting for the right person?" you asked him. "Marriage I mean. Is that why?"

 

"Are you patronizing me too now?" Seto asked, glare narrowing.

 

"No, it's just, do you believe in soul — you wouldn't. Forget I asked." You pulled the blanket higher over you, and stirred your melting ice cream, staring off into its depths. "My family — what's left of it — wants me to get married."

 

It was obvious only after moment that you had invested no thought in how that confession would compromise the realization of it. Your whole body clenched, resisting barely the urge to shut your eyes and disappear.

 

"...And are you hoping," he questioned; matching the words carefully, "that this relationship will resolve in marriage?"

 

You could feel heat rise in your chest and your insides churn. "...I — I don't know," you said, "I wasn't —not entering...I mean I never thought..." You lips continued to contort, open and closed like a fish out of water; no words came, and you were left gaping up at him.

 

"No?" He raised an eyebrow.

 

"No." It was a reflexive response; heart choking your throat.

 

For a moment he would say nothing and you sought desperately to retract those words but with him indecision was not an acceptable response, and either yes or no would be damning.

 

"That makes me question _your_ prospects," he said, entirely calm, before breaking off into a brisk march out of sight.

 

...

 

The study was dark. You looked at the silent clock on his desk, 12:06; then past it to the man fixated on his computer screen. His fingers were locked together, resting against his lips, only blue eyes reflecting neon light moving.

 

"You should at least turn on the desk light, it's not good for your eyes," you said, walking up to him.

 

Releasing a dismissive grunt he waved the lamp on, then his hand returned to once again rest against his lips.

 

"Seto."

 

"What are you doing not sleeping?" His eyes had first glided over the digits on the clock before finding you.

 

"It's late."

 

"Thus my previous question," he said. His eyes narrowed. "Why do you have the blanket?"

 

"It didn't look like you were coming to bed so — "

 

"Were you planning on sleeping here?"

 

"Well — I mean...There's a couch..." You could see the impatience. "Yes."

 

"Then where do you expect me to sleep?"

 

"I'm sorry?"

 

"In the bedroom, while you sleep here?"

 

You mumbled, your thoughts amounting to no particular answer.

 

He snapped close his laptop and appraised you again, standing in front of his desk in a nightie with the strap slipping past your right shoulder, clutching on to a thick comforter pooling on the floor.

 

"Let's go."

 

"I didn't mean to disturb you," you quickly said.

 

"That's an interesting thing to say having come in here. I don't plan on sleeping. I plan on working from the bedroom so you're not walking around the place looking like a lost puppy."

 

"I don't appreciate you calling me a dog," you silently pressed as he passed you. It was a delayed response, or so he would consider; any remark not immediately met with a response he would call as such.

 

"Fine, it won't happen again."

 

"You don't need to come to bed."

 

"No," he said turning around, "but it occurs to me that I should make time for you. Consider this a start."

 

"You spent most of yesterday with me."

 

"And the night before that you spent away." He tugged the comforter balled under your arm and draped it over his. "Go." He motioned with his head for you to leave the room first.

 

"About what I said earlier," you said, "I just meant, we just started dating and I — I don't want to hold that expectation over you."

 

Turning into the room he considered those words in silence. "A relationship which is not a means to an end is a waste of my time. Like I've said, I don't have time for silly Valentine's cards and candy bracelets."

 

He threw the blanket over the bed.

 

You fell asleep to the sound of sporadic typing, considering whether to be assured or unsettled by those words.

 

...

 

It was rare to wake up to Seto. So this was a surprise, the good kind. You found yourself in an unexpectedly comfortable position, your leg slung over him, tangled and somewhat attempting to climb him. He was awake and consenting to being used as a body pillow so you decided to exploit the opportunity as much as he would allow. Nuzzling your cold nose against the warm skin of his neck, your hand roamed his bare chest, feeling the raise of his abs and massaging his pecs, wanting to memorize every ridge and valley on his sculpted form with the underside of your palm; his skin prickled at the sensation. You giggled at the response and it earned you a kiss on your temple. His lips were warm, and the soft touch lingered long after they had lifted. You held yourself closer to him. Brushing away your hair, he leaned in and began leaving sloppy kisses over the side of your neck, sucking the soft skin every so often.

 

"Don't we have to go to work?"

 

"An extra hour won't kill anyone," he said, his hand under you beginning to wander. It crept under your short nightie and drew wave after wave of heart stuttering shivers; fingers never quite pressing down as hard as you would have liked.

 

You moaned his name into his neck, and surrendered yourself to him as he rose to press you under him.

 

"You know what I want," he breathed into the raise of your collarbones, tracing your pulse up to your ear.

 

With a faint nod of your head you pulled him in closer.

 

“Open your legs for me,” Seto said in a voice which still hasn’t recovered from its deep morning husk, and you melted hopelessly.

 

…

 

With all the strength left in your trembling arms you held on to him as he fell onto you. From his burning back slick with sweat, rising and falling from laboured breathing, you treaded your fingers to his dampened hair. His weight was crushing.

 

Even for a man with his endurance, this morning’s escapade was an impressive feat. This time he had nothing left to give, but he still moved between sore hips. His pants were hoarse above you.

 

You asked for him to move off of you, your body needing to meld into the sheets, all at once, sore, numb, and exhausted. It had been as if he was possessed, taking you over and over.

 

You turned to him as he with a laborious effort rolled off of you to lay face down on his pillow.

 

“Seto, are you sure you’re okay?” you asked again.

 

At the absence of a response you made to sit up, fighting his heavy hand draped over your stomach. He held you down andpulled you to his side.

 

“You need some water — or something,” you argued, pressing your palm against his cheek. “You can’t even catch your breath.”

 

“I’m fine,” he rasped. “Lay down...don’t screw it up.”

 

“What?” You were left staring up at the tall ceiling, listening to his pants disturbing the still room. “Screw up what?”

 

He wouldn’t say.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, let me know your thoughts!


	20. The Long Game

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! It’s been a really long time since this fic has gotten an update, hasn’t it? I’m sorry about the long wait, and also for being terribly behind on comments. For those of you who have known me for a while now know that I try to get back to every single comment. I’ve just been sick as a dog and then with work, finding the inspiration to write even when I had a few minutes to spare became really hard. That being said, I really do enjoy reading your comments and I will reply to every single one. I’ll be flying again soon so there might be some lag in uploads but I’ll try to do better!
> 
> I hope you enjoy this chapter, and for all my new readers and commenters, please be a little patient with me while I get myself back in gear!

 

“It’s starting to pour out there,” you said Friday morning.

 

He offered you some form of grunt, unbothered to lift his head away from paperwork. You continued to stare out at the grey city under the storm’s heavy assault, from behind his desk. It had rained yesterday too.

 

“Kaiba Corp. jets can take off in worse weather situations,” he said, having finally turned to you at your silence. “...Are you afraid of rainstorms?”

 

“No,” you said looking over your shoulder to him. “I rather like the rain. Although...I would much rather be cuddling in bed with you.”

 

The forwardness of it visibly caught the young CEO off guard. “Watch what you say in the office,” Seto chided. “And as I recall, we did that yesterday.”

 

A smile which straddled coy and scheming bloomed across your face and you ambled the few steps to him.Abandoning his fountain pen he spun his chair to you. There was a stutter in your chest as you leaned over him, knee between his legs on his seat. You pressed it further, massaging the junction of his thighs as you took his willing lips.

 

Your fingers slipping to tangle behind his neck, you lowered yourself to sit on his lap. Swallowing your lips you stole one hand away from his hair, gliding your fingertips down his lapel, over his belt buckle to where your knee has been pressing.

 

Until you met his gaze he waited patiently. “What are you doing?” Seto grunted, though nothing in his expression refused your affections. When your hand pulsing against him paused, his hand rose to grab your hair, knotting at the base of your neck. “I didn’t say stop.”

 

“I don’t know what you mean,” you replied, groping his arousal with a firmer hand, “your secretaries are outside.”

 

“I hardly think they’ll mind me fucking my third in here.” You appeared scandalized, though you appreciated how effortlessly crude he had the ability to be when the occasion called for it. “The room is soundproof. I can lock the doors.”

 

“It’s two in the afternoon.”

 

“I can’t say I see your point.”

 

“I was hoping the incentive of it would encourage you to cuddle and watch the rain or something.”

 

“We need to be at the airport in a few hours, I don’t have time for that. That being said — ” he pressed two fingers between your lips, and you obliged just as you knew he expected “— I need you to take responsibility for what you started.”

 

Eyes fixed on his, you sucked his fingers down to his knuckles.

 

His lips curled up in satisfaction. “Good girl.”

 

His palms caressed your thighs all the way under your skirt and tugged at the lace of your panties. Raising yourself against him to kneel on his chair you allowed him to slip it down to your knees, then past them to be slung against one ankle.

 

His wet fingers from between your lips sought the junction of your thighs under your skirt and held in a blissful whimper.

 

“Stay there,” Seto said, and you knew the distinction in his voice when the words were an order. Still, it was difficult to obey when your legs were already weak with the promise alone of the affair; a seeping warmth slick against the inside of your thigh. 

 

He rolled his fingers between your lips, and you folded into him, your own fingers digging into his shoulders. You swallowed your lips to restrain the building moans.

 

“You little slut,” he said against your neck; your face was buried in his hair. “For someone who wants to cuddle, you’re awfully wet.”

 

“Seto...please.”

 

His long fingers buried themselves between your slick folds and it was almost bearable, the pulsing lightning which plunged up your core each time they rolled over the apex of your crease; you held him tighter and tighter. And then they hooked into you. The building anticipation, the pressure you had held in the tenseness of your thighs and your clenched jaw, he disrupted with a stinging finger and you collapsed on to him, letting out a long sigh which straddled a moan.

 

He had no compassion for you trembling against him, and he wouldn’t allow your folding knees relief on his lap. His hands cupped your bare behind and forced you to stay kneeling, and the next you felt was a burning sensation splitting across your skin.

 

“I think I told you to stay as you were,” he rasped. He smirked as you looked at him with confusion and disbelief. There was a haze in your eyes. “Did you like that?”

 

You said nothing, or maybe he didn’t give you enough time to say something, before bringing his palm harshly against your ass again. Swallowing your lips, you squeezed your eyes closed; you wouldn’t deny if he asked that there was certain thrill in it. He spanked you a third time and you bit back the whimper which almost escaped, steadying yourself.

 

“Do you?” he barked.

 

You nodded furiously, yes, eyes still closed.

 

He hit you again, and again after that, and under your fists, you bunched the fabric of his suit jacket, knowing by the tingle which prickled across your skin that it had reddened.

 

For a moment you held perfectly still. Then you felt his hand moving up and down your arm.

 

“Am I hurting you?” you heard him ask and only then did you open your eyes. The question had been...unexpected though not as much as the concern in his tone.

 

You shook your head, breathing out the rush you had held in. You almost brought yourself to smile; you liked him like this.

 

There was the clink of his belt as he unbuckled it underneath you, and soon he was lowering you to sheath his arousal. You clenched from reflex as his tip parted you and he reminded you in an even tone to relax.

 

His hands on your hips guided your rhythm of your rutting hips; and you held darkening indicolite under your hooded eyelids. Each time he raised you there was a moment of respite to breath out the welling exhilaration before he filled you again; and you let your head fall back, eyes fighting to stay open fixed up on the white ceiling. You must have moaned his name a dozen time; your fingers grabbed at his neck and collar.

 

His palms caressed the lithe contours of your form up to your back. He brought down the zipper and with a firm tug persuaded the eyelet fabric of the dress past your small shoulders.

 

You lifted your head to look at him, his eyes under heavily creased brows were rested on your bare breasts, but he was cruel and his slender fingers held you by your upper arms, stopping just short of where you wanted to be touched the most. Your breath grew hotter and hotter in anticipation, hoping his fingers would follow his hungry eyes, but they would not.

 

In the end you conceded. “Touch me,” you breathed, leaning against his lips, “please.”

 

A smirk sharpened his lip.

 

Lifting you from him, he turned you, pulling your back flush against his chest. As he lowered you to him, his hand found your pert breasts, nipples tight with anticipation, and the other the junction of your thighs, rubbing you in circles.

 

“Like this?” Seto asked, there was slyness to his tone; under the ministrations of his fingers he could feel you unravel.

 

Your response was whimpers, admitting yes, he drove you to the edges of euphoria. In your impassioned haze, behind closed eyes, in his silent office, all you could hear were repeated pants falling against muted moans. Occasionally, you would hear him rasp your name, and you his.

 

On your arched back, Seto kneaded your full breasts, fingers tugging at your elongating buds. His hips rose again and again to meet yours; your head fallen back, his temple was muggy on your cheek.

 

Then without warning a shudder broke through you, you trembled in waves, allowing it to consume you. It would begin again when you thought it had stopped, as if it was a very long shiver, one from which you just couldn’t get warm, and it sent tingles to your toes and fingertips. There was a comfortable fire lifting all the weight from you.

 

You stuttered his name through your palpitating heartbeats and he kissed your cheek.

 

When you recovered, you turned again to face him, and he stood with you. He pinned you on the cold glass and continued to make love to you with steady thrusts. It quickly dissolved to shallow pulses, and his breaths grew ragged.

 

“Come inside me?” you whispered in his ear and suddenly his arms around you grew tighter; his grinding hips grew faster.

 

His kissed your neck, your jaw, before finally finding your lips. Then he found sanctuary against the curve of your neck, his cursing and throaty groans — noisier now — breaking against your soft skin.

 

You could feel him throb inside you, and your raw walls spasmed at the sensation. He held himself with just enough composure to fill you again a handful of times before he filled you completely. His whole form shuddered, nearly crushing you in his arms.

 

You shivered again with pleasure feeling his warmth seeping into you.

 

Your forehead pressed against his you smiled. He looked up to you with an unyielding hardness to his expression. You could tell he was still in the midst of collecting himself from his high.

 

Seto let you down to stand and helped you slip your arms through your dress. Having done up his belt and buckle, he sauntered back to his seat.

 

“You might want to go to the bathroom and sort yourself out,” he said.

 

Picking up your discarded underwear slung on a handle of his drawer, it was at the door you realized that you had both forgotten to lock it.

 

…

 

The storm had worsened by the evening, and the raindrops like vengeful swords pelted the runway and assaulted the windows, obscuring your view of the airfield stretching out in every direction. In the distance you could see mere silhouettes of grounded planes; no flights would be taking off from Domino airport until the morning. All except his, the words of caution offered by the airport authorities were suggestions, the final word, as it always was, left entirely to his discretion.

 

You sat by the window, the posh but sparsely decorated cabin disturbed only by the stewardesses rushing about in pencil skirt and stylish garrison like caps which reminded you of what girls’ generation had worn during a certain era.

 

Seto was in the cockpit exchanging some supposed quick words with the captain which was taking longer than you had expected.

 

There was lightening breaking up the sky now.

 

“If you’d rather we fly tomorrow, let me know,” Seto said, appearing suddenly beside you.

 

You answered him without much thought. “You would miss the dinner Paradigm is hosting tomorrow night.”

 

“I wasn’t asking about that, was I?” he asked, a little harsher perhaps than he had intended to be. “I was asking what you thought because you look unsettled.”

 

“That is what I think.”

 

“Fine. Then at least get away from the window.”

 

“Why?” you began to ask but he had already yanked you to stand by your arm. It wasn’t forceful in a way which hurt, in fact there was a sense of calculation to the gesture, an odd effort in the midst to be gentle. “Seto!”

 

“There’s bound to be turbulence. Don’t sit by the window as if it’s the only place to sit.”

 

“And the seat beside you is?” you jibed as he pulled you to the curving lounge at the centre and plopped down against the back rest, closing his eyes.

 

You stood for another moment or so before, at the absence of a response conceded. You watched how his Adam’s apple rose more conspicuously on his neck arched back.

 

“You know, you should sleep upstairs in the bedroom. You’ll feel better with some rest.”

 

He opened his eyes and directed them straight to you.

 

“What makes you think I’m tired?”

 

“The fact that the only real day of rest you had in the past few weeks was yesterday and you fell asleep mid-conversation more than a handful of times and today was meeting after meeting and I didn’t even see you drinking a sip of water. I worry about you, you know.”

 

“You contradicted yourself, I wasted enough time for the both of us yesterday.”

 

“...You spent that time with me. Is that wasted time for you?” He looked ready to answer. “Or am I asking for too much space from you again? In your life?”

 

“That’s not what I meant you know that.”

 

You shook your head no. “I can’t know what you don’t tell me.”

 

“Let me get a drink after take off. Then we can go get some sleep.”

 

You smiled gently, covering his hand resting on his thigh with yours. Weaving your fingers through his, he almost closed his eyes again, though instead he leaned forward, reaching for your seatbelt and clipping it.

 

 

…

 

Seto hadn’t wanted to stay at the Ritz, or the The Goring. The Bulgari has been too somber in its misguided decoration. He wanted nothing traditional; something which resembled less the pattern of an old woman’s curtains on his bedroom window, somewhere — he had said in a silken tone in your ear — he wouldn’t feel as if he was marring tradition when he did unspeakable things to you under the sheets. That, you had told him eliminated every hotel in London.

 

In the end he had rented a penthouse in Chelsea, overlooking a busy street congested at all hours of the day with double deckers. The long glossy halls were as narrow as the streets outside, caged to the high ceiling in windows with geometric wooden frames reminding you of the traditional orient’s sliding doors. There was nothing traditional about it though, and despite the pots of China punctuating the corridors housing white orchids, and old English settees in the drawing room, the white floors were sprawled with black square patterns.

 

It was in some sense a mansion spread on three floors, receiving a great deal of sunlight in the morning, especially in the high ceiling bedroom guarded with gossamer curtains. There were wrought iron balconies curving the windows outside.

 

The sunlight, it was the first thing you noticed. On the ride there, you had been occupied mostly with counting your blessings that the border agent hadn’t questioned your travel history. A new name on a new passport couldn’t make you a new person. When he had asked for it at the gate, Seto had taken it from your hand and opened it as he handed it along with his own. He hadn’t once looked at it, and you were always very careful to keep it away from him. It had a shortened name, but ultimately it was a loose end for him to unravel your past with.

 

“You should get some sleep, unless you’re hungry,” Seto told you as his driver left the bedroom, having set your bags near the closet. You curiously wandered around the grand bedroom, your hands bound behind your back.

 

“I wouldn’t mind something to eat. I saw a M & S on our way here, maybe we could pick up a few sandwiches and bread and butter puddings for breakfast.”

 

He scoffed. “You expect me to go grocery shopping?”

 

“You act like I asked you to go to a LIDL or ASDA with me.”

 

“You know an awful lot for someone visiting a city for their first time,” Seto said hanging up his coat. “...I’ll have the housemaid have breakfast on the table,” he added at your silence. “Go have a shower.”

 

You silently conceded, slipping away to the adjourned bathroom. Passing on the ostentatious claw foot bathtub you elected for a simple shower.

 

Just as the shower started to run he came in without warning. He took off his shirt and tossed it over the marble counter and bent over to throw a few splashes of water across his face.

 

“You should get some rest before dinner tonight,” he said leaning against the sink with both hands. He was faced away but you caught his eye in the mirror.

 

“What about you?”

 

“I’ll be working, but I don’t plan to be anywhere.”

 

“I see.” You knew better than to ask the man to rest more than once in one day, and you were feeling more tired than you had expected to be to put up a fuss worth raising.

 

There was something obviously amiss with you. Granted, flying was never the most pleasant of activities but you could never recall being this fatigued on any previous trip overseas. Briefly, your hands wandered to rest over your stomach, wondering if something had changed, but wouldn’t allow yourself to linger too long on the thought, half convinced that he could read your thoughts.

 

…

 

Seto was reading the newspaper when you joined him at the table for breakfast downstairs. It seemed an odd combination though not in the least bit mismatched, just sort of...odd, unexpectedly analogue.

 

He folded it with an expert flick of his wrist and laid it out on the table.

 

The cutlery was set out already.

 

“Are you feeling better?”

 

“I’m sorry?”

 

The chair scraped rougher on the hardwood floor than you had expected it as you pulled it away to sit down. The maid set down two plates of waffles topped with an egg and a drumstick she explained was duck. The garnish and gravy she set to the side.

 

“You look pale,” he noted, taking a sip of his coffee. You could tell it was from the bitter aroma circulating the sunny dining room surrounded by the kitchen.

 

“It’s just the fatigue. It’ll wear off.”

 

“You... if you’re not feeling up to it, stay in tonight, there’s no need for you to attend the dinner at the risk of fainting.”

 

“I’m not going to faint, I’ll be fine,” you said picking up a fork.

 

At your insistence he seemed pacified, and after a moment of tracing his eyes over your every feature, he directed his attention back to the newspaper.

 

…

 

There was something combing through your hair, that much you could decipher in your sleep, though that feeling of all encompassing warmth and bliss remained a mystery, and you attributed it to your hazy state between sleep and reality.

 

When you woke up, it was to the sound of the cranking of the bathroom door handle beside the bed. Seto walked out in only a towel wrapped low on his hip, while drying his wet hair sticking in every direction with another towel. It was at once endearing and somewhat titillating, seeing him so undone .

 

“Did I wake you?” he asked, standing over you.

 

You shook your head no, a content smile you wouldn’t realize you wore, on your face. “Are you getting ready to go?”

 

He hummed in confirmation. His tux hung across the room.

 

“You should have woken me!”

 

He stood blocking your way, anticipating your mad dash to the bathroom as you tore the sheets away.

 

“Are you sure?” He left you with the vague question, watching you expectantly.

 

“Am I sure what?”

 

“You can stay, if you’d rather not come...If you’re not ready yet.”

 

He needed to stop speaking in riddles.

 

“Seto I really don’t know what you’re asking me. All I know is that I’m not going to have time to wash my hair if you don’t let me use the bathroom.”

 

He stepped aside then, though with much reluctance.

 

…

 

Simple black dress which reached your calf with floral lace adorning the plunge neckline, minimal make up and simple strapped sandals which helped ease the height difference; you hadn’t had enough time for a hairstyle more elaborate than sleekly straightened hair parted down the centre.

 

Seto draped a string of what could only be diamonds coming from him, around your neck. You stood in front of the full length mirror, fingertips grazing it as if feeling the cut of the stones helped see it better.

 

“We’re already late,” Seto said, stepping away from the mirror. When he stood behind you again he was holding your long black duster over your shoulders. You turned to him with an expression which spoke mild surprise and caution. His brows furrowed. “It’s beginning to look grey out there. Would you rather I carry it?”

 

“I can carry it.”

 

Wordlessly he slung the coat over his arm and made for the door.

 

His consideration was charming, you thought waiting on the pavement for the car, but it disconcerted you somehow. Was he apologetic to you for something, was this compensation? Was the thing he was apologetic for his imminent departure?

Your reaction as he covered your shoulders with your coat was that of a frightened cat. You jumped, and he quizzed you with a bemused expression.

 

“You’re shivering,” he said. “What’s with you?”

 

Again you shook your head in dismissal. “I’m fine.”

 

“If you’re going to lie to me,” he said, opening the door to the car as it pulled up, “at least make it believable.”

 

…

 

An older gentleman who’s blond hair was quickly fading to white, dressed in a black tux identical to Seto’s greeted you both at the pier. Mr. George Wells, Paradigm Group’s President and CEO, he exchanged a brief greeting with Seto. The party had waited for your arrival, he had said. He couldn’t possibly have the yacht leave the pier without his most anticipated guest.

 

Then his head turned to you, a curious glint in his eye. “Who might this young lady be?” His question was followed immediately by a rationale, so as to not offend Seto, you assumed. It was that Seto was never accompanied by a guest who wasn’t his younger sibling, and a young woman on his arm was the least expected sight.

 

Prior to that moment, rather stupidly in hindsight, you had never considered a respectable answer to that question. You suddenly understood his hesitation in having you attend. You had never wondered if the title of being his girlfriend was one he had afforded you for the sake of pacifying you in private. Did he want that information divulged?

 

Your expression crumpled, you realized, but it began to bother you acutely just then; what this man would think of you in that next moment, what would everybody?

 

You resolved to introduce yourself as his executive assistant, any other explanation would spread like wildfire. Though you understood it would raise more questions than settle, why did Seto insist on bringing his employee on his arm?

 

“My partner.” Seto was a split second faster, introducing you by first name. The host extended his hand and you accepted. It wouldn’t yet sink in. 

 

The gentleman addressed you once again as he held his arm out in invitation to board the yacht. “And what is it that you do?” he asked. This was why a respectable answer to his previous question could never be as simple as Seto had made it feel.

 

“She’s still in school,” Seto said intervening.

 

“Is that right?” Mr. Wells asked, handing you both a glass of champagne from a passing waiter. He paused to inquire if you would prefer something else; the offer you both politely refused. “Then it begs the question of how you met.”

 

You exchanged a nervous glance with Seto but he remained passive and as inscrutable as ever. “I’m afraid the story is rather dull George, it may even disappoint you. We just happen to run in the same social circles.”

 

You could feel your stomach turn.

 

“Certainly nothing worth making a movie deal over but I’m still curious.”

 

“We frequented the same restaurant,” Seto replied smoothly. “She spilled wine on my suit.”

 

“That’s one way to get a man’s attention,” Mr. Wells said laughing. “I’m sure if other young women knew that was all it took to get your attention Seto, they would have tried it sooner.”

 

Seto released something of a scoff and a grunt of amusement, and the conversation diverged into how he met his own wife over two decades ago before being introduced to said wife.

 

Those questions repeated many times over through the course of the night but now you had a well tried script to apply. The inhibitions still lingered, a sort of gritty sensation, a hesitation each time you delivered those words, but it was believable enough. Just enough for them to smile an accept it.

 

It had taken you half the nigh to ask Seto what it was the dinner was celebrating.

 

“Are you asking me that only now?” he said, though his tone was calm, and lacked its usual prickly consistency. It was patient, and maybe even attentive.

 

You were standing away from the party, overlooking the Thames from the lower deck balcony, the warm summer evening cut by the cool air blowing up from the water. The horizon was swirling purple over a Tower Bridge lit in gold and white. It was looming closer, the bridge and the rare twinkling stars scattered stingily.

 

“I sound like one of those girls don’t I?”

 

“An airhead, if that’s what you’re asking? No. You seem to have a lot on your mind.”

 

It didn’t seem like a question, and even less an invitation to leave your thoughts, so you said nothing, filling the silence with a deep breath. It wouldn’t stretch for long enough, though luckily he had more to say.

 

“It’s a dinner celebrating their expansion to entertainment. They acquired a production company.”

 

“They seem to have assets in everything, I assumed entertainment was something they were already involved in.”

 

“Partially. Depending on what you consider entertainment. They have a lot of influence over amusementparks like Thorpe Park and organize events and shows during London Fashion Week. Movie production would be a first for them.”

 

You nodded in understanding, grateful he possessed no apparent interest in expanding on his remark on your having a lot on your mind.

 

 

…

 

Seto looked at the trail of discarded clothing leading in from the bedroom door wondered if in some way you considered him stupid. You were a bright girl, he would admit, astute and very meticulous in everything you did. Sometimes your determination to survive translated to recklessness and it had been a quality more amusing to him than your beauty; that unyielding will and sheer nerve. The nerve to toy with even him. At first he had waited to see how far it would go, and over the weeks he had come to many conclusions on what you had made of him.

 

Stupid, he thought, holding your sleeping form against his bare chest; you underestimated him to such an extent that stupidity was the answer, even you of all women had the capacity to be stupid.

 

Still, it was endearing somehow, your peaceful expression when you were sleeping; how your lips formed into a slight pout. It made him content that at the end of each the day, you came back to him for cover.

 

He picked up the small blue leather box and opened it to reveal a diamond ring as striking as the man who had bought it.

 

 

This time tomorrow, it would be on your finger. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> LBD at the office: https://pin.it/jzcvnotclmcdmh / https://pin.it/n33t74a22e6el7
> 
> LBD at the dinner: https://pin.it/abrwlfnkdvay47
> 
> Let me know what you think!


	21. The End Game

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! This, what I’m sure is the longest SMYH chapter is only a few words shy of 9000 words, which is partially the reason it took so long. Most of the other chapters in the series are 2000- 3000 words max. Anyway. A lot happens here, so I hope you enjoy!

Morning; Seto was sat by the window, the sheer curtains half drawn as he scrutinized the slow moving traffic below with a steaming mug of coffee in hand. You could smell it from here, and it was likely the only tangible thing to separate sleep and reality and convince you that you were actually awake, that pungent, nausea stirring smell of coffee.

 

It could only be telepathy, how he seemed to know the instance you were awake. His head turned to you as if he had been counting down to the moment, expectantly.

 

“Are you finally awake?”

 

“Finally? It’s like — ” you flipped over the nearest phone on the night stand, which happened to be his “— seven in the morning. Do you even have anywhere to be today?”

 

“No,” he said, “the last two times you mumbled nonsense and fell back asleep. You have an unexpectedly strong grip in your sleep.” As if in painful recollection he raised his fingers up to the roots of his damp fringe

 

“What?”

 

“You decided you could convince me to come back to bed by grabbing a fistful of my hair.”

 

“Sorry.”

 

“It’s nothing I’m not used to from you,” he said in dismissal, standing up.

 

Heat flushed your face at the remark and your cheeks grew hotter as he crossed the room to you.

 

“Seto?”

 

“Hmm?”

 

He sat beside you on the edge of the bed.

 

“I’ve been meaning to ask — ” you pulled yourself up against the headboard, bunching the sheets up to your chest “— why exactly am I here? I mean, you said you didn’t want me wandering around alone back home but then — ”

 

“Why do I take you to the parties?”

 

You nodded. “...Well, yes.”

 

He answered without missing a beat, “Do I need a reason for introducing my girlfriend to my associates?”

 

Your girlfriend...

 

The words played in silent repetition in your mind. Meanwhile, your face housed a blank expression, eyes strayed far from him.

 

“You’re someone they ought to know. I introduced you as my partner, didn’t I?” he asked as your mind looped over in a momentary lapse.

 

“Yes but...” You sighed.

 

“Is that not good enough anymore?”

 

“What?”

 

His eyes darted pensively across your face before settling on a response. “Never mind. Come with me somewhere.”

 

“Where?” you asked.

 

“Wipe that drool off your face and get dressed if you care to find out,” he said, standing to leave. His back turned he stalled for a moment, then leant back down to you, wiping his thumb against the corner of your lip.

 

…

 

A forty minute drive out to zone six had led to this, you found yourself standing in the middle of an airfield, tarmac runways stretching as far as you could see until miniature buildings sprung up in the distance. There were small passenger planes taking off into the gloomy morning, sweepingairwaves from spinning helicopter blades adding to the chill which persisted the summer. It was all at once loud, while stuffing your ears with a pausing quiet; chaotic and calm.

 

The sweeping tussles adorning the hem of your blush satin coat flew up around you in a flurry.

 

You had never before seen Seto in a leather jacket. It brought back an image of Eiichi that day on his motorcycle, though there could never be any comparison. Not as Seto was, in a black leather jacket, dark wash denim jeans, buffed Italian leather boots and hair a touch messier than he usually wore it. It made you hold your eyes down, afraid he would see your face flushed the shade of a pomegranate.

 

Without realizing, you had grabbed on to the edge of Seto’s jacket cuff, fingers slowly creeping unbeknownst to even themselves for his hand. He acknowledged the gesture with the slightest turn of his head and a squeeze of your hand in response

 

Seto was speaking to someone, a gentleman who oversaw the operations of the private airport; from their conversation you felt they were long acquainted. And in spite of this small acknowledgment, his exchange continued uninterrupted. You didn’t think the tall gentleman even noticed him distracting for the briefest moment.

 

Seto was in need of renting a helicopter for the morning. For what, remained without explanation. That he had an international pilot license was less surprising as it was impressive. Swoon worthy even, though little that he did was ever not.

 

Your hair a storm about you, you held down your billowing coat with both hands.

 

“Where are you taking me?” you screamed above the roar of the whipping blades.

 

“You sounds like I’ve taken you hostage,” he quipped as he helped you — pulled you by the hand without the slightest strain of his expression — into the helicopter, the initial invitation to go somewhere with him still accompanied still with no details of the itinerary for the morning.

 

Your questions unanswered, your heart lifted in your chest with the helicopter. As it climbed, your hand reached inadvertently for his forearm. It became less important where you were going. Simply the thought of him beside you, alone together a few thousand feet above this magnificent city of old houses and palaces, their gardens, and glass towers packed meticulously as neighbours, in a gradient transcending the passage of time...it was exhilarating.

 

Look over the curving Thames, and all the bridges which crossed the olive grey waters, you wondered perhaps if this was his interpretation of a bike ride along the river. On his own terms, in his own definition, was this a romantic outing?

 

He still would give you no explanation to confirm it. But you could dream.

 

The view beneath you was would be carved into your memory for as long as you lived, but so would his image be. You found yourself engrossed in him. You couldn’t account for when your hand had slipped from his forearm to his hand gripping the controls, always careful not to alter his grip. Just the feel of his skin under yours was soothing. It was only called to your attention when he reversed his hold, wrapping your hand over the lever while guiding it with a firmer hand around yours.

 

Your breath caught at the suddenness of the motion. “Seto are you mad? What are you doing?” you screeched.

 

“Calm down,” he said, composed and only as condescending as you had come to expect of him. His grip around your hands tightening, “Steer it,” he said.

 

“Have you lost your mind? Are you trying to get us both killed?” In your reflex to snatch away your hands and lean as far away as he would allow, you grappled at the control, lurching the helicopter a few hundred feet to your left as if a windswept bird in a storm. You called his name in your horror, eyes squeezed shut. There was the urgent need to cry, but you found yourself transfixed as you were.

 

The motion disorienting, it was impossible to tell when the helicopter had stopped swaying in erratic swings.

 

“I’m not going to let us both fall,” you heard him say in a tone of overwhelming confidence twinged with exasperation. He called your name in an easier tone, urging you to open your eyes, but you remained as you were, one hand fallen to clutch your stomach, the other bunching the lapel of your jacket against your chest. The second time he called your name was accompanied with the distinct unlatching of a buckle. You felt lighter. “Come here,” he said.

Through reluctant eyes you looked on to see your safety belt undone. Fresh fear surged through you, yet still it was him you reached for.

 

He extended his hand. “Do you trust me?”

 

“What?” you squeaked.

 

“Stand up and come here. Let me teach you something.”

 

“Are you crazy?”

 

“While that’s incredibly subjective, no. Now come here.”

 

At first you imagined he was crazy. All those late nights alone in the office could make a man crack. As you looked at him though, unable to distract, there was something in that determined gaze which called for you to nod, and stumble over to him. Your legs threatening to fold, you fell onto him. Guiding you to sit between his legs, he strapped his arms as if a sturdier seat belt around you, one hand always on the control. His breath behind you heated the curve of your ears.

 

“Are you alright?” he asked as he felt your back against his chest rise and fall quick and shallow.

 

You nodded slowly, relaxing into him. Over your shoulder you met deep blue eyes, fixed on you with a certain patience, concerned even.

 

“What are you afraid of?” he asked, the closeness of his throaty voice pouring into your ear resolving in a shudder breaking all over. “...Falling?” he continued. “What makes you think I would let that happen?”

 

“I — I...”

 

“Coming up here, I was intending to teach you the basic flight controls of flying a helicopter,” Seto said, “but following what just happened, it occurs to me that teaching a girl without even a driver’s license the specifics of manning an airborne, twenty thousand pound piece of machinery may not be the best idea.”

 

“Sorry,” you muttered, swallowing your lips. Looking over the city streaked with the shadows of clouds and the wash of escaping sunlight opening up under you however, in the safety of his arms, there was a renewed desire to try again. Blood was pulsing under your skin, it was madness, but you felt once this moment was over, it would never again be in your grasp. And the regret of it scared you more then than plunging a few thousand metres to the ground. “Teach me...properly, I promise I’ll do better this time.”

 

His response was a silken laugh. “That sounds more like my woman,” he rasped in your ear, injecting the sort of electricity which coursed through to the root of your teeth from overly sweet chocolate, down your spine.

 

His long fingers guided your hands to hold the shifting lever, before closing around them; your fingers disappearing under his completely. Your stomach flipped, nausea stirring you. Even so, you heart soared. In reality, his fingers still controlled the many switches and buttons along the controls. He taught you the various dials and switches, how the cyclic controls functioned though feet never left the pedals. Still, even the illusion of it was thrilling.

 

Over your shoulder he pressed his lips against yours.

 

“This must be breaking at least a handful of laws,” you said to him.

 

“A handful sounds to me like an optimistically low number,” Seto said.

 

This earned him a distressed expression. The nonchalance in his response was a true reflection of the man, you understood, but it did more than just unsettle you. You would admit, it turned your stomach a little.

 

“Relax,” he drawled, “laws are helpful suggestions, though by no means absolute.”

 

“In whose world?” you argued.

 

“In mine, and in due time yours. Don’t sound so obedient, it’s much too resonant of the middle class.”

 

The topic could seem to go no where further, fully exhausted, as was your ability to challenge him. This sense of elitism and entitlement sounded so chillingly familiar.

 

He asked you if there had been anywhere you wanted to go. Kent, you said. Perhaps an obvious destination if he had known who you were, your family owning a summer house in the sunny but sleepy county. It would be full of flowers this time of year you told him, and hopefully cloudless beaches, but at one point in what felt to be a monologue, you wondered if he was listening, receiving only a hum and the occasional kiss on the cheek as he focused ahead. The only indication that he had been were his guiding hands steering the controls. You had even supplied the excuse as to how you knew so much of a place you had never visited — that it had been from research for a school project on tourism — to the silence of crickets and another pensive grunt. 

 

On the way there, and on the way back, you received from him a generous dose of affection; attention you couldn’t be sure, but enough many kisses to get you through a bad fortnight, perhaps even a month.

 

You were still walking on clouds when he lifted you off the helicopter to stand again on solid ground. And for the rest of the afternoon, you were a lost cause, staring up at him with stars in your eyes as you clung to his side.

 

…

 

Entering the little mansion you shared together in Chelsea in early evening, he pulled you down the hallway and into the bedroom. There was a dinner reservation you would potentially be late for, from what he had said, but in that moment there was a matter the slightest bit more pressing needing to be taken care of. And enthralled by him, you would give him anything he wanted.

 

You kicked your heels under the bed as he clambered to be on top of you. The affair which he had intended to occupy no more than half an hour carrying on much later. 

 

You woke with a start to Seto pulling himself up against the headboard, the languidness of his movements betraying that he had also only just woken. Still without concept for time, in your half asleep state, all you cared for was cuddling closer to the warmth his bare chest radiated.

 

As he shook you awake you groaned. “Five more minutes,” you said, searching for any space he left open to crawl closer.

 

“It’s well past seven,” he said, discernibly groggy, pitch fallen a register, “reservations are at nine thirty, get up. You don’t have the time to be doing this unless you plan to be there in a bathrobe.”

 

“Who are we even going to see? I didn’t see anything on your schedule,” you mumbled, nuzzling his chest. “...Can we not go?”

 

He peeled you away, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. You thought it strange that a man as punctual and careful as him would come so close to missing an prior engagement.

 

“Out of the question. Put on that dress I had altered for you and be ready in an hour.”

 

You imagined it was someone of notable significance if he had felt the need to have you attend in a tailored Maison Valentino dress.

 

“Oh but you’re so warm,” you cooed.

 

Seto spoke your name scoldingly. “You’ll take half the night to dry your hair,” he said. “Use the shower before me if you want to have any hope of being on time.”

 

…

 

Dressed in a black tux, as he stood behind you in the mirror, fumbling with the clasp of another diamond necklace you were seeing for the first time draped over your collar bones, you wondered if you had ever before seen him with his fringe swept to the side. Not just in person, had you in any tabloid or magazine article?

 

The more you grew to know him, the less interesting the florals wreaths of diamonds he gifted you seemed. They all paled in comparison, embarrassed beside him.

 

“Do we have to go?” you asked him as he finished, reaching over your shoulder to hold his hand which had just released your clasp. “I’d much rather stay in bed with you.” You raised an expectant eyebrow at him in the mirror.

 

“Be downstairs in five minutes,” he said assuming a sudden stiffness, “I’ll have the car ready.”

 

“Who exactly are we meeting that you’re so tense?” You turned to him, reaching to squeeze his arm.

 

“What makes you believe that?” was his reply, now all the more hostile.

 

He picked your coat from the hook curving from the back of the bedroom door and draped it over your shoulders with an inscrutable expression before promptly making his exit while tearing away his own on the way out. 

 

When the car came, you were waiting on the pavement. Seto held open the door to the backseat and guided you in, shielding your head with an open palm held above. The drive was silent, there was an unaddressed discomfort, not that you were willing to engage him in conversation. Instead you slipped an arm through his, leaning in with caution to rest your head on his shoulder. You could feel his gaze brush over you just as your anxious gaze stealing a glance veered away from him, though only for a moment. He still wouldn’t say anything, the tenderness this morning having faded to naught.

 

Your heart boiled wondering what you had done to cause it.

 

…

 

“Seto,” you called him as the host led you past the reception into the dining hall of the Ritz. His eyes drifted down to you on his arm. He could find nothing else more disinteresting as he did you in that moment, you concluded. Those blue eyes glass, your words were dry in your throat. “Seto, who are we here to meet?” you asked in a small voice. “I...need to know so I can be ready.”

 

“No one. It’s just us,” he said.

 

“Just u—”

 

At the table he held out a chair for you, distracting you. He was a man who had the effect. You sat down thanking him, and he gently pushed the chair forward. As he took his own, and your server was introduced, you sat perfectly still, absolutely stunned.

 

The server offered you a wine menu, and though your eyes saw the finely scrawled script, it was an idle gaze, with no intention of committing to conscious thought its contents.

 

“She won’t be drinking,” Seto offered in your place. You thought him a keen observer of your thoughts though nothing more. You were fine with your water. He ordered for himself some bitter sounding concoction, and the gentleman dressed in black excused himself.

 

It was in then you looked around, heart in your throat though there was a ringing silence in your ears. The room washed a soft coral, the renaissance statues dipped in gold, the murals in hues of mint and primrose and the gilded garlands hanging alongside the chandeliers from the ceilings, it was all as you remembered; even the white linen draped tables circling the hall, and the grand piano tucked to the corner.

 

It was a different man across from you then. At times like these, they were rare and few and far between, but at times like these, with a stinging twinge in your chest, you missed your brothers.

 

“You look beautiful,” Seto suddenly said. It was abrupt and out of place.

 

“Thank you,” you replied none the less. It was a knee jerk reaction, you supposed.

 

He cleared his throat, beginning to flip through the menu. A dark expression donned your features, forehead wrinkling. Fingers paused over the edge of the cover, you had no thoughts of opening to look inside.

 

Had he brought you here, dressed you in a gown from Paris’s most sought after design house, gifted you with diamonds worth your weight in gold, all in preparation to leave you? It was the first thought, though you disagreed with yourself for a moment as you remembered his compliment to you just then. It seemed practiced, you reasoned, the opener to a soliloquy which would let you down easy. Then again he wasn’t the gentle type, but his expression was much too contrived in his attempt remain impassive. Had your relationship run its course?

 

The couples seated across the dining room blurred and disappeared around you. You didn’t notice your expression twisting. You felt sick, and it showed.

 

“Are you feeling alright?” Seto asked, cutting into your bubbling anxiety. It was more a forest fire actually.

 

“I’m — glad you brought me here, to London, with you. I would have missed you...in that big old apartment back in Japan. I think now after spending so much time alone together, I would miss you on the nights you don’t come to the penthouse.”

 

He said nothing, panicking, your thoughts raced, and stupidly, you tried to translate them to him.

 

“I— I really like you,” you heard yourself saying, hands clasped so tightly in your lap that they burned white. “...A lot.”

 

“Thank you,” he said calmly, “though I don’t think I’ve ever quite heard a confession that disorganized. Not directed at me anyway.”

 

“Sorry,” you said nervous, “and I’m sure you’ve heard your fair share.” You took a large gulp of your ice water. You sounded a complete moron, pathetic and utterly stupid.

 

“More than I care for. In fact I wish it would stop.” Seto winced internally at his own words. They had been meaning to convey that he didn’t wish to hear the confessions of other women anymore, building up to the most important question, but instead they appeared to crush your spirit. “I’ve heard the one I needed,” he said gruffly. “What are you ordering?”

 

That was a lot to decipher under the fall of one breath. You could only gather enough sense to answer his final query.

 

“I don’t know,” you said, “I haven’t looked yet.”

 

“It would help if you opened your menu,” he said, eyes returning to his.

 

When the waiter returned, asking after your order, there was hardly a pause before Seto’s attention snapped up to you. “What will you have?” he asked.

 

You had decided then but you still hesitated. “The cutlet and fillet of lamb,” you said, snapping the menu closed, hoping it would return some illusion of confidence to your decision and you. “...Please.” But then you’ve only ordered the main course, and had not even read through the first courses they offered. Your head was all out of order.

 

Seto was pensive. “As I recall, you don’t enjoy yoghurt in savoury dishes. The dish has yoghurt,” he advised.

 

“Does it?” you asked, your voice shallow and ears burning. He would only look at you blankly. “Oh. Picksomething for me then!”

 

If the request irritated him, he mastered his expression so it wouldn’t show. “Veal sweetbread and Norfolk crab to start,” he said. “Then the roast bresse duck for her and the lobster for me.”

 

Closing his menu and handing it to the waiter, he went on to order dessert for the both of you. Crepe Suzette, to be prepared at your table.

 

“Are we celebrating an anniversary?” the waiter asked with a pleasant as he collected your menus.

 

You didn’t realize you had been smiling expectantly at Seto until he fixed you with a quizzical expression.

 

“No,” Seto responded curtly, taking a sip of his drink.

 

“It hasn’t been a hundred days for us yet has it? I mean officially,” you asked Seto. Enthusiasm spilled like honey from your tone.

 

“Hundred days?” your waiter asked, filling your water again.

 

“Like one year anniversaries, a hundred day anniversary. It’s not really a thing here,” you explained.

 

He smiled in understanding, before leaving you two alone.

 

You reached across the table for a Seto’s hand, clasping your small hand around his fingers. Smiling, you hoped he would return it. Instead a stiff expression looked back at you. Your heart thumped against the your throat, hot ropes tensing around heart.

 

“Is everything alright?” you asked, reaching for his other hand. Your brushed your thumb across his knuckles.

 

“Perfectly,” Seto replied. Then watching you as if a specimen under a microscope, he seemed to form another thought. “I’ve given it some thought,” he said.

 

“Seto,” you interrupted, not wishing to hear it. At least, not quite yet. “I have to tell you something.”

 

He hummed, inviting you to go on.

 

“I had a really great time today.”

 

He waited for you to continue. It was an odd thing to have interrupted him for, you knew.

 

“That’s it?” He raised a suspicious brow.

 

“I — it’s really very pretty in here isn’t it?”

 

Again he hummed.

 

“Have you been here before?”

 

“Several times,” he answered.

 

“With a different girl?” You ventured without a care for the danger of his reaction.

 

“With my brother, or for business,” he said stoically.

 

As dinner was served, through the first and main course, conversation rarely escalated beyond your compliments of the dish, or the silence which persisted in your quiet observance of him. He had reserved himself to silence, though you weren’t blind to how he watched you, scrutinizing every detail. It was deeply unsettling.

 

Several times you choked in your state of distraction, prompting him to scold you for being careless.

 

Dessert arrived on a buffet server on wheels housing a single burner and a pan. The waiter asked after your meal and Seto replied simply with that it was excellent. A hard won compliment, if the waiter only knew.

 

Tossing a handful of sugar over the pan. “You two look like you’ve known each other for years,” the waiter said smiling. It was casual conversation.

 

You smiled up at him. It had been a good day, perfect even in spite of his silence. Seto took a disinterested sip of his drink, unconcerned or perhaps even annoyed by the exchange. 

 

“Why do you say that?” You were curious.

 

“You seem comfortable with him,” the waiter replied. You had believed you had looked entirely the opposite the whole evening.

 

“Do I?” you asked with a smile which swallowed your lips, looking down at your lap.

 

Then the sugar had caramelized. Stirring in butter, orange zest, orange juice, and Grand Marnier, the waiter threw in a pancake to the sauce. “I would keep my distance,” he warned, tipping a generous pour of brandy in. The pan danced up into flames and you were the whole dining room’s stage.

 

Unbeknownst to you, Seto watched with certain pride your wide smile glowing with the bursting flame. It stayed, he observed as the waiter set the plate of flambé crepe in front of you, a scoop of French vanilla ice cream on the side.

 

When your eyes lifted to his, still swimming with wonder, he defaulted to his scowl. Seto appeared to bemuch less impressed at his own plate, his scowl persisting.

 

You thanked the waiter for the brilliant display. And as he left, it was truly mesmerizing, was it not, you asked Seto.

 

“I suppose it was,” he answered.

 

You ate a couple of bites in silence. An inexplicable stutter in your heart convincing you that it was impossible to breathe. What was wrong with him tonight?

 

You reached for his hand again and he recoiled. He wiped the corner of his mouth with his napkin and set it on the table. This was it, a part of you echoed. You wished he would deliver the sentence swiftly. Would he then walk out? Or would you be damned to endure another awkward drive back home together side by side?

 

“Like I said,” he began again, “I’ve given it a great deal of thought. You may believe that this is... sudden. And you have reason to.”

 

You watched transfixed, unable to act on your impulse to stop him. He stood, reaching into his suit jacket and retrieved something into his closed fist. Still, you could say nothing. His expression was stern as he walked to you.

 

So this was not what you expected.

 

He reached for your hand and turned you in your chair to face him. Your hand still in his, Seto brought himself to kneel before you.

 

One by one as if a ripple across the dining room, you watched eyes turning to you.

 

“I’ll take responsibility of you,” he said, for the first time speaking in Japanese that night. Your breath caught, and you didn’t think you could ever recover. He snapped open a blue velvet box to reveal a glistening diamond the shape of the clearest drop of water. “I can’t imagine it being anyone else...Marry me.”

 

Your eyes darted between deep cerulean, searching for sincerity in their sharpness, perhaps waiting for him to correct himself. To walk away.

 

Except he never did. He looked up at you patiently, waiting, holding expectantly your disbelieving expression. Was there any woman on earth who would refuse Seto Kaiba? When he said nothing else you finally strung enough coherence together to speak. “You— you want to marry me? You want me to...be your wife?” Your words dissolved to gasping breaths from there, threatening to cry, wanting to laugh but not believing all that was around you was real enough. “Seto you want _me_?”

 

The dining room held their breath.

 

“Yes,” he said.

 

“Say it again,” you breathed. “Ask me again...to be your wife.”

 

“Marry me,” Seto said again, speaking your name softly. It was less a request, and more a demand, and the sureness in his tone of what he wanted, as he always did, it was all the more reassuring.

 

“Yes!” you said, nodding furiously, the piping pitch breaking thinly across the paused room. He slipped the ring on to your finger, albeit forceful in how he tugged it to sit against your knuckle.

 

You didn’t even care to properly look at it. All you knew was that it was weighed on your finger heavily as you lunged forward to embrace him.

 

The room erupted into a roar of applause, accompanied by the odd whistle.

 

He caught you with one palm against the side of your face as you broke your embrace, pulling you into a kiss. As you parted, for the fall of a breath you both remained still, your foreheads leaned against each other. It was silent for you under the clamour of applause, he drowned out all else. He was a man who had that ability.

 

“I’ll be good to you,” you promised him. “This is all I ever wanted.”

 

With another fleeting kiss on the lips, Seto stood, assuming his seat across from you. You received the delighted congratulations of the young couple to your right. From the older couple to your left, following a hearty congratulations which you accepted beaming, you learned they had been married for almost forty years. They wished you all the happiness, the woman said, while the gentleman offered Seto unsolicited advice on how the most important lesson in life was that the wife was always right. One he said he wished now he had learned earlier. It was all in good humour, and you couldn’t fight the laugh which escaped you as you watched Seto struggle to maintain a pleasant expression for your sake.

 

Carving a bite of your crepe with your fork, you hoped you could help the souring mood. Hooking your fingers through his again across table, you held it out for him.

 

“I wanted to feed you a bite of my dinner all night but I was sure you were going to break up with me today,” you told him. “I thought I had offended you somehow. Now say ah.”

 

“Why would I go through this much trouble to break up with a woman I had lost interest in?” Sitting as he was, he wouldn’t move an inch towards the crepe wrapped around your fork.

 

“Seto do you know how scared I was that you were trying to leave me?”

 

“I wouldn’t.”

 

He still wouldn’t take a bit. “Come on eat it, the ice cream is going to melt and drip everywhere!” you said whining.

 

“But then again,” he said, “what can I expect from a simple minded child like you?” He stole the fork from your outstretched hand before eating it.

 

Seto returned the fork to you. “Now don’t expect anything ridiculous as having me feed you in a place like this just because you’re going to become my wife.”

 

Oh how you would never tire of his taciturn indifference.

 

…

 

 

“I don’t understand why it stands that all rich people have to be miserable...in their lives, and especially in their marriages,” you said, snuggled to his side on the drive home. “Being with you seems so easy.”

 

“That’s because you’re an optimistic child,” Seto said in response, though he lifted your hand you had woven through his, kissing the back of your left palm with at least half as much affection to dispute his own words.

 

“Oh I don’t care,” you cooed, looking unblinkingly at your hand he was holding, the diamond ring he had slipped on to your fourth finger still had not yet disappeared. It was a miracle. You brought your hand entwined in his up to your face, nuzzling it.

 

Against your cheek you felt the brush of his nose, and you turned to be captured by his waiting lips. Breathing in deeply against them, he began to kiss you. At first they danced fleetingly, teasingly, motioning to suck your lower lip in but letting go, then he decided it wasn’t enough. He leaned in. You could feel his weight on you then the sound of his seat buckle unbuckling. Then yours. His lips had started an aggressive campaign on your lips now, rolling, sucking, licking. His lips burning of alcohol, your own tongue coated bitter, you still couldn’t mind it.

 

Your hands sought his hair to stay upright, his satin strands your grounding.

 

His lips lifted away but then you felt the hot caress of his tongue, tracing your cheek from the corner of your mouth to the edge of your jaw. Something of a squeal escaped you, perhaps even cried out his name accusingly. It felt good however, and when he finally pulled away to meet your eyes, his own scorching, you couldn’t bear the loss of his touch, and though breathless, pushed yourself up to him for a kiss.

 

It was too sweet for his taste. His lips wandered down the column of your neck to the raise of your clavicle. The wet stroke of his tongue punctuated by a sloppy kiss. His lips had found your tightly bound breasts pushed up against the dress’s corset. He breathed in deeply again, before leaving open mouth kisses to their centre.

 

You couldn’t help your drawn out moan, hands still in his hair.

 

When the car stopped, he carried you out, your legs wrapped around his waist. Your hands cupping his face, his lips wouldn’t stray from yours even as he slipped the key into the lock and turned it open. Spinning with you effortlessly across the the threshold, you could feel the search of his fingers for the narrow head of your zipper. Then there was the slight tug, persuading it on fine teeth down your back. It forced him to distract, and the closure halfway undone, you met your housekeeper in the corridor.

 

Immediately, your eyes grew three sizes, you scrambled to fall off of him, knee landing square on hardwood. You wished her a good night, before bunching your skirts and running past her up the stairs, leaving your fiancé stunned in awkward silence alone to send her home. 

 

…

 

Seto bade you over to him with a demanding, stiff flick of his finger while he sat leant back on his armchair, a relaxed arm resting over the armrest; a striking juxtaposition to his inpatient expression as he took another sip of bourbon. A scowl you would go so far as to mark down as a defining feature, almost as those gorgeous, stormy blue eyes were, adorned his lips.

 

Naturally, you obeyed, ambling closer, appearing to be in as much of a rush as he was, or at least as much as he was letting on.

 

“Strip,” he said, words the crack of a whip, their decisive sharpness perhaps deepened a degree by the alcohol in his system. It startled you to a stop steps away from his. “Your dress,” he drawled, following another long sip, “it’s in the way. I think I’ve seen it enough tonight...I want to...see you.”

 

You swallowed the think knot webbing your throat.

 

You knew exactly what he meant and yet the bluntness and the resulting crudeness in his request was giving way to inhibitions.

 

A thought occurred to you then. One in spite of your unchanged intentions, expectations — hopes you had held of him, however one wished to word it, only just then surfaced. This was no longer a hot blooded affair with an inevitable expiry date in the undetermined, but very near future. He was the man who would be your husband, and it suddenly became much more important, how he regarded you; how much he respected you. It could no longer be the sole priority, entertaining him with the single minded purpose of keeping him in one form or the other.

 

Self-respect, why did it always take second priority to the desperation of wanting to be wanted?

 

“Seto I— I’m not wearing a bra.”

 

He swirled his liquor. “I think that’s the point.”

 

You swallowed again.

 

“Seto I don’t want to —“

 

“I’ll stop drinking,” he said, setting down the glass with a punctuating thud against the wooden side table.

 

“No, that’s not it I —“

 

“Would it help if I washed my mouth?”

 

“Seto it’s not the alcohol,” you interrupted him.

 

“Then what is it?” Irritation curled his tone into a snarl barely contained.

 

“I just —“ you sighed, at a loss, fiddling with your fingers; never looking up. “I just don’t know if I — don’t want to feel like.”

 

“Like what?” He hated indecision you remembered just then, and in that sudden realization which transformed swiftly to a quick fright which pricked in waves every fine hair on your body, you dismissed yourself.

 

“It’s nothing,” you said, shaking your head. The zip was tugged down and the dress pooled like a deflating parachute by your feet. You stepped out of it and walked in what was almost a tiptoe to him. A brush of cold air roused taut your full breasts now bare.

 

You had captivated his undivided attention, he let you know; his eyes somehow not blinking, his drink on the nightstand whether forgotten or abandoned you could not be sure.

 

By the wrap of his limber fingers he persuaded you on to his lap, though his smouldering gaze would have been enticing enough in accomplishing the same even in your present state of crisis.

 

You met his lips fleetingly, his many kisses though brief, passionate.

 

As he pulled away, you sat awkwardly on his lap, noses just touching but not, hunched into yourself. You were acutely aware of your skin prickled all over.

 

He rubbed his warm palm — large enough you felt to cover your whole back — up and down your protruding spine.

 

The warmth in the gesture encouraged you to look at him, though as he matched his lips to yours, you pushed him away. Undeterred by your feeble note of resistant, he persisted, and your palms flat against his chest, you flinched, rejecting him.

 

“Seto stop — stop it. You’re — I feel like you’re still...toying with me...like I’m some thing you can pick up and play with when you feel,” you said; from habit, eyes closed tightly as you delivered your thoughts in anticipation of the consequences which would certainly follow.

 

“What on earth are you on about?” he demanded to know, now unable to forgo the call of the alcohol. He drained his glass of cognac and set it down as if to punch the wooden surface. Still, he offered you patience, not just yet pressing his needs.

 

You stood in this opening his gave where he wasn’t holding you.

 

“What else is there?” he asked. “Have I not given you what you wanted from me?”

 

“Marriage? Yes,” you said in a small voice. “You intend to marry me, yes?”

 

“Why else would I have proposed?” Seto questioned gruffly. Sensing your apprehension, “I intend to register the marriage as soon as we return to Domino,” he added.

 

“Register the marriage?” The surprise was evident, it jumped forward in your tone before you could even realize it.

 

“Are you against it?”

 

“No, no of course not... if that’s what you want.” This reared the heads of a whole new crop of problems. You wondered if it was too short notice to disown yourself from the family register a second time. “We’re both tired. It was a long day. I think it’s best if we both go to bed,” you told him, turning away with an arm folded over your chest.

 

Stripping the throw blanket draped over the foot of the bed to wrap around you, you didn’t hear his steps as he followed you to your vanity.

 

Leaning in from behind he gently swept your hair over your shoulder, inspiring goosebumps. The jewels weighed coolly on your skin contrasting the warmth of his brushing fingertips.

 

“You asked me how a husband would make love to his wife,” Seto husked in your ear, his hands slipping from your shoulders to grasp at the contours of your form over the fleece blanket. Your stomach fluttered with a simultaneous weakness and excitement. “I can’t speak for other men...” He traced the back of his index finger over the side of your neck. “...But let me show you how I plan have my way with you.”

 

His call was difficult to refuse, but you still faltered away. He breathed your name in a tone which pressing at the boundaries of his patience.

 

“Come here,” he said, his eyes closed as he nuzzled his face against the side of your neck.

 

You too closed your eyes. You could feel the back of his fingers brush bare skin as they undid the roughly knotted blanket. The fabric tumbling to your waist, he cupped your full breast with large palms, massaging them gently. He pressed kiss after kiss against your neck and your resolve grew weak; the rising warmth in your chest became dizzying, seeping up to pound behind your ears.

 

“Seto,” you mewled, motioning your surrender by turning your head up to face him. He took your lips in response, then slowly lifted you from your seat, carrying you to the bed.

 

Laying you supine, he hovered over you, caging you with one arm while he undid another button with his other. From his dishevelled brown hair, past his dark eyes narrowed in concentration, impeded only the slightest by the whiskey, to his white dress shirt beginning to loose its crisp, you allowed a small smile at the sight of him.

 

The fear lingered on the skirts of his embrace, the fear of being a sport or a pastime to him, but he was a difficult comfort to refuse. Even smelling of alcohol, and without the promise of honest affection, he was comforting wrapped in all his mystery. Though that was most definitely not his allure, his mystery. Quite the opposite in fact, that impossible sense of familiarity.

 

“Seto,” you called him, placing a hand on his cheek. Kneeled between your legs he was removing his shirt. He stopped mid motion, the shirt caught on his elbows. By a raise of his eyebrows he questioned you, inviting you to continue. “I — I think I love you,” you said, afraid that you would swallow and choke on each word.

 

A strange smirk tugged up his lips. “Of course you do,” he said. He sounded so sure of himself. As if it wasn’t the first time you had told him, as if he had been expecting it, or heard it before.

 

He removed his shirt. His pants followed, then his briefs. He was as always, careless with how he stripped you of your panties, scraping your skin over the raise of your folded knees, snatching impatiently when they caught on your ankles. He pulled the comforter over the both of you, then he started to make love to you.

 

Your breathing was an erratic mess, fingertips curling against his sculpted back. He had one arm anchored against the headboard, looking over you, too tall for his eyes to align with yours. It was easier for yours to rest on the bobbing of his Adam’s apple each time he swallowed or even his bare chest, but they kept wanting to climb up to his face, always searching for reassurance.

 

The whole bed shifted under the force of his thrusts, bitten back grunts escaping him. There was a shiver threatening to break, cradled between your hips, but afraid that would give way to a gushing orgasm and you wanted to wait for him. Your eyes shifted up to the ceiling.

 

“Seto — ” it was a hoarse whisper, “— I love you. A good — good wife, I promise I’ll be good. I’m happy now...because I know you won’t leave me. I’m so happy.” It wasn’t very coherent, then again how could they be under a man like Seto Kaiba, but those were your thoughts. And it didn’t matter in what order, you knew you wanted him to hear them, because tomorrow, you would swallow them again.

 

He didn’t pause, but you saw his gaze narrow and sharpen. An arm scooped under you then, his whole body falling against you. He moved in lithe waves, pressing you deeper into the sheets. You felt his weight, but it was comforting somehow.

 

He pulled on the crook of your knees, guiding your legs to wrap them around his waist. “Stop babbling nonsense,” he husked, slipping one hand to hold the back of your head against his chest.

 

He could reach you deeper now, at this angle; your soft breasts taut from each time they grazed his hard muscles slick with sweat, you moaned, swimming in sweet delirium. You would be oblivious to how aroused he grew at these sensations, at the delicate point of contact where your breasts pressed against him, your innocent mewls reminding him of your willing submission.

 

Your lips quivering, the valley of your breasts beaded with sweat, clinging on to him as if to life itself, as Seto looked on, the desire to exert complete dominance over you, to master you and choke you, to let you feel the burn of his leather belt on your soft skin, to see it redden as you promised to behave while shedding any last shred of moral reservation, though only for him, it drew him mad.

 

The thought of such a surrender, it was overwhelming, even for him, though the glint of his ring on your finger was a reminder that there would be plenty of opportunity for that. Now was a time to turn your misgivings of him, regardless of how ridiculous he deemed them, in spite of how little he could find understanding for them. It was only important that you shared his last name.

 

Seto forced himself to hold back, to be gentle, to concern himself with every wrinkle on your twisting expression; for the first time perhaps he asked himself, were his ministrations pleasurable to you?

 

“Does it feel good?” he asked, hovering over you again, his rhythm smoother, his hips slowing each time they came to meet yours.

 

Your eyes squeezed closed, you released something which resembled a “Mhm,” following which you again dissolved to hopeless moaning.

 

“Be quiet,” he ordered, a wild smirk playing on his face. It was impossible to not play with you like this even a little. In truth, Seto found your cries thrilling, but there was an inexplicable eroticism in the mortification which flashed across your flushed face as you slapped a palm over your own lips in a desperate attempt to silence yourself.

 

This forced quiet during which only the beating of flesh against each other and his panting filled the room, lasted but a few seconds, before he found your weakness, and at first you only jolted violently, though as he ground himself against it over and over, more of that delicious pleading moans erupted from your swollen lips.

 

Leaning in, he pressed a chaste kiss to your temple, at least he had intended for it to be; for all he knew it was sloppy and rough. He embraced you again and husked in your ear, “Does it feel that good?”

 

You seem to burst at that, him having pulled away the last string keeping you together, and you trembled, pleading for him to hold you tighter. Shuddering, your fingernails dug into his back, raking across the raise of his muscles.

 

When you recovered, his musky scent and the damp warmth of his skin was surrounding you, his laboured breaths shortened to broken pants, pouring in hot waves over your hairline. All of his expended energy which he forced between the junction of your thighs, in the new found rawness of your walls had ceased to be a building excitement, dissipating quickly into a soreness.

 

“I’m close,” Seto grunted with certain difficulty; his strokes shorter and more erratic now. “I’m — I’m coming.”

 

You could summon no more strength than to look up at him like a doe in headlights, exactly as you had been, before his strained groan filled your ears, first, before his sticky warmth filled all of you. It was always a sensation you particularly relished. It was exhilarating. Closing your eyes, you smiled.

 

And perhaps at the end of the day, the thrill was in the burrowed feeling of receiving some part of him, any part of him that you didn’t have to share with the world, or anyone else.

 

Did it make you feel special?

The thought was heavy on your heart as you considered it further. Was that all there was in your relationship to him to make you feel special, wanted even? Was this what carried you where his words wouldn’t?

 

As he pulled out of you, the slick wetness squelching between your thighs as you turned away from him, he seemed to noticed the distance.

 

“What is it?” he asked, pulling you into him from behind.

 

He left a brief kiss on the curve of your ear.

 

You exhaled deeply, overcome with a drowning melancholy all of a sudden. “Do you respect me?” you found yourself asking. It was a terrifying question, at worst, he would take your ring back.

 

“What?” A cross between tired, buzzed and irritated, you flinched. Again, he noticed. You were sure this time. “I asked you a question.”

 

“Am I — am I important to you in some way, like, would you be sad if I was gone and no longer here? Or am I just a sport to you? Is sex all you need from me?” It came across harsher than you had intended, though definitely not any more harsher than what you had been imagining of yourself in your mind.

 

“I can’t begin to understand what goes through that head of yours,” Seto snarled. “I give you everything you ask me. Is fucking my wife a sport to me? I’ll leave that to you to figure that out but of all the things I won’t ask of you in this marriage, understand that if you’re not willing to sleep with me, I can’t see us working out.”

 

“Men always look elsewhere, regardless,” you mumbled. Whether you had ever meant for him to hear, you couldn’t be sure.

 

“Not all of us are like your father,” Seto spat.

 

“How would you know my father?” You struggled under his heavy arm to turn to him.

 

“It was an educated guess.” His eyes darted away from your face after a moment of scrutiny, up to look over your head somewhere into the distance. “How would I possibly know someone I’ve never met?”

 

“Do you...want to meet him?” you asked him.

 

“I don’t know what sort of men you’ve known in your life but let’s make one thing crystal clear. There is nothing more repulsive to me than an unfaithful partner. I’ve never entertained with escorts and I’ll certainly never keep anything like a mistress, so don’t you dare accuse me. I expect you to be faithful to me and not bring whatever skeletons you keep in your closet into this marriage. I don’t have time for that bullshit. Do I make myself clear?”

 

“Perfectly,” you said softly, eyes falling.

 

Seto only spoke after a long while had passed and you were teetering on the edges of sleep. “That said, if you’re ever willing to have an honest discussion about your life before me. I’m here.”

 

 

…

 

 

The evening you returned to Domino, Seto informed you of a dinner he expected you to attend with him. You had only heard of the occasion on the drive back from the airport, and the subsequent drive to the restaurant had devolved quickly to be an impassioned affair involving you straddling Seto in the back seat of his car, with your silk panties stuffed into his suit pocket where his pocket square ought to be.

 

You arrived at dinner late and just a little more than visibly flushed.

 

He wove his fingers into yours and something smooth and hard pressed into your palm.

 

“I believe you’ve been looking for this,” he said nonchalantly, before walking in slow strides towards the waiting party.

 

You opened your palm to your mother’s signet ring, the emerald catching the chandelier lights.

 

Beyond him, you could make out the two awaiting men more clearly now; sat facing each other were your father and his designated fiancé for you.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Her tassel coat dress: https://pin.it/6qhso5vix7jonx  
> The engagemnet ring: https://pin.it/4uaa4qxe4r47ff (imagine this but bigger to accommodate Seto’s ego.)
> 
>  
> 
> If you think anything resolved here, let me tell you, shit’s just getting started. 
> 
> Let me know what you think!


End file.
